


The Found Weekend

by Lang



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Humiliation, M/M, Serpent!Jughead, dub-con, then pretty enthusiastic consent shortly after, unprotected sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-15
Packaged: 2018-11-23 15:48:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 29,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11405562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lang/pseuds/Lang
Summary: For the kinkmeme prompt:Part of Archie's initiation into the Bulldogs requires that he go down to the South Side and antagonize the locals there. Unfortunately for Archie, he pisses off Jughead Jones, the teen leader of the Serpents. Archie gets knocked out and wakes up in Jughead's trailer, a gift from Jughead's gang to him. Jughead decides to have some fun with him for the weekend. Archie is a little bit more into it than he's comfortable with.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> And now for something a little different.
> 
> Jughead will make more sense by the end, I promise.

Friday night.

It was one of the younger Serpents, skinny and pale underneath his jacket, who they put to watch Archie. 

Archie they'd tied to a chair with his legs open. Which was humiliating. The Serpent, who had to be around Archie's age, sat in front of him in one of those old-fashioned aluminum lawn chairs, the weak light from the overhead bulb playing shadows on his smooth jaw.

"I'm sorry," Archie said. "Look-- if you just let me explain--"

"The way you babble? More like please don't let me stop you from explaining," said the Serpent, with a roll of his eyes. 

He was being sarcastic. Archie didn't see why he had to be sarcastic. He already had Archie tied up and humiliated. And, okay, Archie might have babbled a little, but only because the whole thing hadn't been his idea. It had been Chuck's. Archie would have preferred to spend Labor Day weekend walking Vegas and practicing music. Trying to avoid calling his dad and upsetting the whole divorce thing, as opposed to really, _really_ wishing his dad would come rescue him.

Once his babbling had gotten to this point, this Serpent said (like he was suggesting a fun game activity that had just bobbed to the top of his head), "Maybe we should pay a visit to your dad, then."

So Archie's heart seized up. So Archie explained how his dad was out of town in Chicago because of the divorce coming, how his dad had nothing to do with this, and how proud his dad had been, actually, when Archie had made it onto the Bulldogs --

"Last year," the Serpent said now. "One of you started a fight in our bar. Reddy, was it?"

"Reggie," Archie said immediately.

"And then another one tagged South Side High. Bison? No, Caribou."

"Moose."

"Thank you," said the Serpent. And then he lifted up one long leg and put his boot right on Archie's _crotch_ , and _rubbed_ \--

This was when things got weird. This was when Archie got so red it must have made him ginger all the way down to his soul, flushed with humiliation at how this boy was just -- just _humiliating_ him.

"Chuck said I had to get the team a Serpents jacket, okay?" he said desperately. "I didn't want to and I didn't plan to spend my weekend fighting with you guys and--don't do that!"

Rubbing. With his foot. Casually, like it wasn't even a big thing that his dirty boot was getting Archie hard through his jeans.

"Didn't anybody warn you not to come to the South Side?" said the Serpent kid. "You Riverdale High kids really look out for each other."

Betty had looked out for him. Betty had absolutely insisted, "Arch, just tell Chuck you won't do it. Stand up to him. This isn't team bonding. It's hazing."

But Archie hadn't listened. So now a Serpent was playing with him in the worst way, the most humiliating way. Rubbing him like that, just hard enough that the friction was so good. Good and demeaning. Archie was leaking pre-come all over the inside of his jeans. He asked the Serpent to stop, but the Serpent didn't even answer. He just smirked and kept rubbing. Like it wasn't even a big deal.

Archie was breathing hard, mortified, when the door clanged open and another Serpent came in. He put his hands on the back of the first one's chair almost respectfully. The first Serpent sat there like a king and didn't even react, didn't stop rubbing Archie. Just flicked his long lashes up at the new one.

"He's not lying," said the new Serpent. "Boys went and checked his dad's job and his house--"

"You went to my _house_ \--"

"Your name is written on the inside of your underwear," said the first Serpent, sounding bored.

"You checked my--" 

"Yes. While you were knocked out."

All said short, like it wasn't even a big deal, and then this -- this Serpent that seemed to know just how to make Archie firm up and also want to crawl in a hole and _die_ \-- was waving Archie quiet. 

Or waving at the new Serpent to continue. Either way, he had this distant look in his eye when he did it. Like Archie being humiliated didn't bother him. Like nothing did. Like he didn't get normal rules like "don't send your gang to people's houses" and "don't read the name on the back of their underwear" and "don't shoe-fuck them until they're trying to rub back but can't because you tied them to a chair."

"There's a sign," said the new Serpent now. "His dad's out of town and won't be back until late Monday, Jug."

 _Fuck_ , Archie thought, through the friction and the need and how badly he wanted this kid to rub a little harder.

And then Archie thought about the name Jug, and _fuck_ just wasn't a good enough word to capture his level of freakout.

-

Everybody knew Jughead Jones. Arsonist. Menace. Son of a criminal. 

And the current leader of the South Side Serpents. Not just your average Serpent. But actually, really, the one you didn't ever want to meet.

"Listen, I won't ever come here again. I'll stay away. You'll love how much I just -- just never, ever bother you," Archie said, while Jughead Jones dug his heel lightly into the base of Archie's cock, made Archie hiccup with humiliation.

"Oh, I already love you," Jughead said.

"What?" Archie managed.

"There's no sincerer love that the love of a good meal," Jughead said easily.

Eventually Archie came all over the inside of his pants. Jughead Jones put his foot down and leaned back, satisfied. 

He hadn't dismissed the new Serpent, so the new Serpent got to watch the whole thing. Archie thought that was maybe the worst part. It would have been better to just have Jughead there. Jughead was almost pretty, with a mouth as wide as Betty's, hair as dark as Ronnie's. And if Archie had just come in front of _him_ , somebody that nice to look at, somebody who knew way too much about Archie after thirty minutes of Archie's nervous talking, like this was just a really weird date or something...

Well. Maybe that wouldn't have been so bad. 

But to have an audience made it worse. Made it somehow not about Jughead Jones just rubbing him off in a weird way, but about Jughead Jones putting him on display. Showing he had Archie at his mercy. The new Serpent really, really wasn't ugly either, but he looked like he thought Archie's mortification was hilarious.

"Not so tough when you can make them beg like that, huh, Jug?" he asked Jughead.

-

He didn't know how much time passed. Jughead wasn't always in the room because -- because he was Jughead Jones. He was leadering, doing gang stuff. Archie's brain played all the possibilities on a loop: drugs, arson, graffiti, drugs. Harassing nice ladies and stuff. 

Okay, so Archie didn't really know what gangs did. But focusing on that was better than focusing on the sticky mess in his pants. Jughead had gotten him off and then just walked out and left him there, like it was nothing, and Archie was pretty sure that wasn't going to be the last of it.

They knew his dad was out of town. They knew nobody would be checking to see if he came home. They could keep him all weekend. Betty's mother had taken her to a Women's Morality conference or something, two towns over, so this weekend not even Betty would notice Archie's absence. It would just be Vegas, yipping and yowling because Archie wasn't home, and maybe Archie wouldn't come home. Maybe they'd _kill_ him--

Jughead walked back in. He was carrying a bag that smelled amazing, smelled like Pop's, and he walked right up to Archie and said, "Open."

"What?" Archie said.

"Open."

"No!" Archie said, more on instinct than out of any common sense.

"Okay, I'll eat it. You don't have to ask me twice," Jughead said.

He sat back in his lawn chair and pulled open the bag, peering inside like he liked what he saw. Then he pulled out a cheeseburger. The sight of that was enough to make Archie's mouth water. Jughead took a bite and leaned his head back, sighing happily, like this was a rare pleasure.

Wait.

"Were you going to give me some of that?" Archie tried.

Suddenly he was starving. After practice with the Bulldogs, he'd gone straight to the Whyte Wyrm, tried to get a jacket, been knocked out, and woken up here. It must have been hours since he'd eaten something. So Jughead Jones just sitting in front of him enjoying a burger was somehow just as bad as the shoe thing.

"Were you going to give me some?" Archie tried again. 

"Was," Jughead said, with his mouth full. For someone so pretty he looked disgusting like that. 

"Anyway now I'm not. The food's mine," Jughead added. "You snooze, you lose, pal."

He pulled out some fries, and they smelled so good that Archie's stomach felt like it was doing somersaults the way Vegas did at the sight of a bone. And after that came a milkshake. Salted caramel. 

"This is not fair," Archie said. "This is so, so unfair."

"Hey," Jughead said, suddenly vehement. "What's fair about you S.E. Hinton _Socs_ coming around every year to steal, graffiti, and cause general mayhem?"

He had a point. But Archie kind of had one too, and he figured he might as well say it, because if the Serpents were going to kill him he wanted to go down fighting.

"You're in a gang," he said. "Theft and mayhem is your thing! You should be able to take it. Or stop it."

"One," Jughead said, holding up one of the fingers that was clutching his burger, "We did. We stopped you. Two. We're in a gang. We don't stop mayhem. We cause it."

Then he put his burger down (gently, like it was precious to him), and picked up his milkshake. Took a loud, messy, dramatic sip. With his pinky up. Archie thought about the salty-sweet taste of it and how unfair it was that he wasn't the one enjoying that taste.

"Please," he said, breaking down. "I haven't eaten in, like, hours, dude--"

"The human body can go a week without food," Jughead said blithely.

" _Please_."

Jughead put the milkshake down and wrapped up the burger and fries. Still carefully. Way more careful than he'd been when he was toeing at Archie's crotch. Then he stood up in front of Archie, looming over him. He wasn't really all that tall, but he didn't have to be. Archie was still tied up. Jughead put a hand lightly on his fly.

"May I?" he said.

Archie didn't see what this had to do with getting food. But the subtext was clear. Either he said no, and definitely didn't get the food, or he said yes, and maybe got it? Maybe? 

He'd take a maybe.

"Sure," he said hurriedly. "Sure. Can I have a fry?"

"Can you have a fry?" Jughead repeated, like he couldn't believe Archie was that easy to buy off.

"Dude, just one! Do whatever weird sex torture you want, but give me a fry first. And then the rest after. Can I get the rest after?"

For a second, Jughead looked surprised. Delightedly surprised? That made no sense because he was an evil gang member and Archie was his hostage, but whatever.

"You have zero pride," he told Archie, with a weird little grin.

"I know!" Archie said. "But in my defense, like -- Stockbroker Syndrome and stuff."

"Yeah, you've been here for less than three hours," Jughead said.

Archie frowned at him. That had to be wrong. It had to be longer than that.

"Also," Jughead added. "It's Stockholm."

Then his surprisingly strong fingers were unzipping Archie's fly, pulling down his ruined underwear, reaching for Archie's cock. Archie hissed a little when the cool air hit it. Embarrassingly, just that and Jughead's light touch was enough to get it to perk up again. 

Sure, Archie was still mortified. But his dick -- his dick wanted a repeat.

Jughead closed his fingers around it. His hand was so warm and he seemed to know exactly how much pressure Archie needed, how fast Archie needed him to be. Archie found himself jerking his hips up through his bonds, trying to fuck into Jughead's hand. Breathing hard. Biting his lip to keep from yelling. The thing was, when Archie did this it was usually so impersonal. But now this -- this weird criminal who had no right to be as gorgeous as Betty or Ronnie or Val -- _he_ was doing it. The attention kind of messed Archie up. He definitely didn't want Jughead to stop. 

Jughead stopped. 

Archie humiliated himself even more. He actually whined about it, low in his throat, without meaning to. 

Jughead sat back down in his lawn chair.

"Food or orgasm?" he said, without preamble.

Archie stared at him.

"What--"

"You get one," Jughead said. "Food. Or orgasm."

"You," he managed. "You--"

"Yes?" Jughead said pleasantly.

"You're evil," Archie said, helpless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: Jughead's bedroom, we meet some Serpents, a lot of heat.


	2. Chapter 2

Saturday morning, Archie woke up handcuffed to Jughead's bed.

He'd picked the orgasm. Then he'd agreed that in exchange for getting some food later, he'd be quiet and not fight while the Serpents gagged him and walked him out to a car. He'd agreed and then gone back on the agreement despite knowing lying was bad, because, okay, he wasn't _that_ stupid. He knew you didn't want to just follow a gang into a shady black vehicle. That was how people got murdered and dumped in Sweetwater River.

Also, he'd figured it would be a good chance to escape. 

It wasn't. There was still one Archie and way more than one Serpent. He got knocked out again, and when he woke up in the morning he'd been cuffed. The handsome follower Serpent from before was sitting by the bed, keeping an eye on him.

"Jug wanted you brought to his trailer," he said easily.

There was another Serpent, a skinny kid with slick-backed hair, by the door. He said, "I'm taking this dope's fries. Later," and did that. Then he let himself out and Archie gave a howl of rage.

That kid looked suspiciously familiar. Maybe he was the one whose jacket Archie had tried to steal. But it was the principle of the thing. When his howl brought Jughead to the room, Archie said, "Okay, you said I could have the food--"

"I said you could have the food if you were good. You were not good, Archie," Jughead said, short about it. He had a very expressive face. When he was annoyed, you could really tell. It was kind of amazing and under any other circumstances Archie would have enjoyed it. 

"I was, actually," Archie pointed out. "I tried not to go with your vicious gang. That's the entire definition of good!"

Jughead said, "Let's not quibble over semantics."

"I don't know what that is, but I didn't ask for that," Archie said. "I asked for a burger and fries! And that milkshake."

Because he really was starving now. Light was streaming in through the narrow windows of the bedroom, so it was morning and he hadn't even eaten dinner. Also, the non-Jughead Serpent looked like he was trying not to laugh at him.

"Joaquin," Jughead said, in what Archie's mom had used to say was a 'long-suffering' tone. "Go warm up Archie's burger. I have to walk Hot Dog and Vegas."

"You have Vegas?" Archie said.

"I went and got Vegas," Jughead confirmed, and then turned on his heel and walked out. Joaquin followed.

Archie hoped Vegas would bite them or something. Vegas _should_. Vegas knew not to trust strangers, especially ones that threatened and humiliated the Andrews family.

But when Jughead came back in ten minutes later, it was with Vegas following happily at his heels. Vegas jumped on the bed and started to lick at Archie's face, overjoyed, and between the rough tongue-bath and joyful yips Archie caught sight of a shaggy white dog adoring Jughead in a similar manner.

"He gets along with Hot Dog," Jughead said simply. "Anyway, this way your dog won't bark and alert your whole neighborhood to the fact that you're not home."

Leave it to Archie to be kidnapped by a criminal genius who could charm dogs.

Charm and shoo out of the room. Then he came back in and closed the door. He produced the burger. He fed it to Archie in pieces. Archie felt kind of dumb eating from his hands like he was a dog himself, but there were some embarrassingly nice things about it. 

Jughead wasn't wearing all the leather he'd been wearing last night. He was just in a thin t-shirt and boxers. His hair was wet underneath his beanie, like he'd recently taken a shower, and he smelled nice. And he was warm. Really just -- just warm and close in a way Archie liked, an exciting way, kneeling so close to Archie on the bed and attentively feeding him. When the burger was done he went out and got the milkshake. Must have gotten it from a fridge nearby, because it was still cold. Archie drank it down and it was bliss. 

"You did not deserve any of that," Jughead said pointedly, his eyebrows going up like he was making a big proclamation. "Because you did not keep your end of the bargain."

"Sorry," Archie said, unrepentant.

His eye was starting to hurt, and his jaw, both places he'd been punched in scuffles with the Serpents yesterday. So he thought he was kind of being punished already. Jughead sighed and pushed off the bed. He went back out of the room and Archie heard the ecstatic yipping of the dogs. Then he came back in with two home-made ice packs and put one to Archie's eye and one to Archie's jaw.

"Ow," Archie complained. "That's really cold."

It was, but Jughead just removed the ice packs and looked down at him, annoyed again.

"You are a really demanding hostage," he said. "If this were Die Hard, or Misery, or even Speed, you would have been shot in the head, Arch--"

"Hey," Archie said. "If you don't want me to be a bad hostage, maybe don't hold me hostage! Not to mention sexually humiliate me and plan to kill me."

"I'm not going to kill you," Jughead said, exasperated. "Why would I order you a salted caramel milkshake if I wanted to kill you?"

Since Archie couldn't really figure out that one either, he kept silent about it. Jughead just looked down at him again. Jughead looking down at him put Jughead at a good angle. Especially in the day, with the low light catching his eyes, highlighting how nicely they contrasted with his fair skin and dark hair.

"So," Archie said. "Uh. You didn't say you weren't going to sexually humiliate me. Again."

Jughead slapped the ice packs back on his eye and jaw. Archie spent the next ten minutes going, "Ow, ow, ow, ow," and feeling pretty horribly used, but eventually the swelling did go down a little.

"Black and blue aren't your colors, Archie," Jughead told him.

There Archie pretty much agreed with him. 

"I'm, uh, sorry we do that initiation thing where we torment the South Side," he said, after a bit.

Jughead was being a lot less weird than yesterday. It was one thing to make Archie want to crawl in a hole and shrivel up like a mortified teen raisin. It was another thing to feed him and walk his dog and tend to his injuries. Maybe Jughead was trying to induce Stockholm syndrome. 

Maybe it was a little bit working. 

"I guess it must suck to have North Side kids bothering you every year--"

"Oh, no. After all, it's only when you can take a break from your busy social calendars of mayoral jubilees and pep rallies and hugging your adoring parents to come remind us we live on the slum side of town," Jughead said, with false brightness.

"Er," Archie said. He wasn't good with people who sounded like they were helping him out in a conversation but actually were doing the opposite. "Right? Again. Sorry."

"Hey, you varsity bros have to celebrate your victories, right?" Jughead said, voice smooth. "And what's a better celebration than reminding us South Siders that _we_ don't have a school team or a shiny mascot, an Olympic swimming pool or a wood-paneled student lounge--"

"We don't have a swimming pool!" Archie said, indignant. "And-- wait. How did you know about the lounge?"

Jughead sat back and surveyed him. Archie felt oddly cold without the warmth of his body right next to him. 

"Joaquin and Ricky and I sneak in some times," he said. Then he brought his hands up and started making dramatic, worrying gestures. "Move all your stuff around. Take selfies in the dark. Go to your teacher's lounge and erase the grades on the papers, give you all lower grades so you can all only go to second tier colleges instead of Ivies--"

" _What_?" Archie said, aghast. That explained so many Ds. "Really?"

"No," Jughead said, laughing a little. 

But the laugh got dark. "Not that you wouldn't blame that on the Serpents too, if you could."

He was pushing off the bed again. He had a weird, jerky way of walking, like a puppet that was figuring out how to do it without strings. It was way more endearing than a gang member had any right to be. Archie found himself squirming to hide his hard-on. 

"Oh boy," Jughead said, not even looking up as he rooted through his closet and pulled out his leather jacket, some jeans, a flannel, suspenders. 

"My dad says this is totally normal," Archie said defensively. 

Morning wood. Getting excited easily. Wanting to date, to fumble, to have somebody sitting close. 

"I dunno," Jughead said, pulling on his clothes. "I would be flattered but I get the sense that you're not the most particular guy, Arch."

That was true enough. It had only been like a week of school and Archie had already dated Val, Betty, Cheryl, and Ronnie. Not all at the same time, obviously. But still each of them in turn. They were all pretty exceptional in their own ways, and Archie was just sort of normal by comparison. So was he supposed to pass that up?

Jughead was dressed now and turning to go. 

"Where are you going?" Archie said. He didn't want to be left alone here. And in rifling through his closet Jughead had produced Archie's new bulldog jacket -- Archie's name in curlicue script and everything -- and Archie hadn't even noticed they'd taken it. He wanted it back. He said so. 

"Maybe I want a totem from the Bulldogs to show I'm a big man," Jughead said, leaning against the door. Archie never leaned or slouched like that, but if he did he thought it would look kind of schlubby or something. On Jughead it didn't look schlubby. It looked no-nonsense, and fiercely independent. A totally new way of standing, one that used door posts and furniture and walls to offload some of the extra work. 

"Anyway, I turned the heat on for you. You won't get cold," Jughead said dismissively. The he left. 

-

He had turned on the heat. To his credit, as Archie's dad might say. 

The problem was that he'd turned it up really high. Archie was sweating buckets in an hour. This time he knew it was an hour because Jughead had a cheap old alarm clock on his night table, so Archie could count every hour. They got more long and miserable as they went on. A few times he tried calling for Vegas, but Vegas didn't come. A few other times he tried yelling, but that did nothing either. The heat in the trailer came from this ancient hissing radiator that was really loud, so probably that was why Jughead had turned it on. That way no one could hear Archie scream while he boiled to death like a person helplessly dropped into a volcano.

"Cozy. Too cozy," someone said around noon, slamming open the door to the room. Archie jumped. It was a huge tattooed man. A Serpent. Obviously. Aside from the tattoos, his long hair and beard made him look like he belonged on the cover of a country music album or something. He strode in, complaining, "it's hot as shit in here, Jughead--" only to catch sight of Archie on the bed.

"Hi," Archie said. "I also think it's hot. This is against, like, so many anti-torture laws. Like the Geneva Contraption."

"What?"

"He means convention," Jughead said, sliding in quietly and closing the door behind him. He sighed. The big Serpent looked from Archie to him and then back again, like he was trying to figure something out.

"I think we've had enough of those pitbull kids to deal with without--"

"Okay, _bulldogs_ \--" Archie said. 

"We're the pitbulls," muttered Jughead. "They're prize-winning chow chows or something."

"You already helped that other one run away with his girl," said the big Serpent to Jughead. "Where the hell does it end, huh?"

"Wait," Archie said. "What?"

They both looked at him. Archie said, "Do you mean Jason Blossom and Polly Cooper?"

The only reason Chuck had even considered letting Archie onto the team was because Chuck's best bro, his co-captain, had betrayed the very principles of Bulldog-hood. Jason had knocked up Betty's sister, Polly Cooper, and then actually run away with her. People had assumed they were _dead_ until they'd sent Jason's sister a picture-postcard from some remote, untraceable location in Canada. Polly had taken up quilting. Jason had grown a beard and decided to run a lumber farm. Cheryl Blossom, being Chery Blossom, had had the postcard blown up to life-size and plastered it all over every inch Riverdale High on the first day of school.

"This is just to remind all you nerds, jocks, and polyester-wearing misfits who had the sheer gall to believe Jay-Jay dead that a Blossom does not die easy!" she'd screeched over the loudspeaker.

And in the background, Principal Weatherbee could be heard saying, "Cheryl, you have absolutely no permission for this--"

At the time, Archie had assumed Cheryl had used sheer force of will to get Jason and Polly to Canada. Now it turned out that maybe she'd used a _gang_. He stared at the Serpents, stupefied by this new information.

"Digger," Jughead said to the big Serpent, a bit of a warning in his tone.

"Yeah, that's on me," Digger said. "No talking in front of the chow-chow, I guess. Why do you even have him?"

"Followed me home," Jughead quipped.

"And he promised he wouldn't kill me," Archie said quickly. It seemed important to get that piece of information out in front of Digger, so that Digger got with that part of the program.

"Jughead?" Digger said, disbelieving. "Kill you?"

"Digger," Jughead said.

"Jughead got on his high horse and decided he was the Dalai fuckin' Lama when we handed him his first gun--"

" _Digger_. No talking in front of the chow-chow!"

"Sorry," Digger said, not looking very sorry. "No talking in front of the chow-chow."

Then, even though Jughead was making motions toward the door, he continued to stand there and look at Archie, confused.

"The chow-chow's dying of heat," Archie said, after a few quiet seconds. "And he's hungry."

"Does he need a walkie?" Jughead asked sarcastically. 

"I mean, maybe, yeah," Archie said. He did also kind of have to pee. 

"Give us a few minutes," Jughead said. "We have to discuss something."

But as he and Digger backed out of the room, a third Serpent walked in. One Archie definitely did recognize, because it was the Serpent who'd caught him with the jacket and taken vicious glee in breaking a pool cue over Archie's head. Little, blond, and mean. He gave a low whistle when he caught sight of Archie on the bed.

"Boy, you are even sicker than your old man was, and that's saying something," he said. "FP know you're a dick-chaser?"

FP Jones, the major drug dealer. He'd gone to jail just this past summer, a little after Jason's disappearance, after the Register ran an expose on the full extent of FP's heroin ring. At the mention of him, Jughead -- Jughead changed. He wasn't the weirdly considerate Jughead of ice packs and dogs and salted caramel milkshakes. Suddenly he was brittle and cold.

"Better than getting two years for -- what was it? Statutory? Thirteen years old, right, Mustang? A little girl."

Mustang leered, looking proud of himself. Archie found himself recoiling, only there was nowhere to go. He just backed into the wall above the mattress. 

"The Ghouls expect you there tonight," Mustang told Jughead. "And you pussy out now -- don't try the stash -- they're gonna think something's up--"

"The kid's not shooting up just because of the fucking Ghouls--" Digger protested, sounding furious.

"Or at all," Jughead said easily. "You're always willing to try the product. What's the matter, Mustang? Getting cold feet?"

"We got underpaid last time because they thought you didn't trust what you were peddling--"

"I don't," Jughead said, short. "It's _heroin_. Anyway this is your operation. You wanted it, you got it. I don't care about it as long as you give the guys dumb enough to tag along a fair cut, and I don't have to show up for it."

Digger looked like he wanted to argue with part of that. Mustang said, "Yeah, you're too busy getting fucked into the mattress."

Jughead looked bored. 

"Is this the part where we give in to gay panic?" he asked flatly. "Let's not."

Then he was on the bed again, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a knife. Archie tried to reel back but there was nowhere to go, since he was already against the wall.

Jughead cut his t-shirt off. He made it a show, too, with a dramatic rip that left Archie's chest totally exposed, gleaming with sweat. Archie got the sense that this was like before, this was a game, a little humiliation in front of his crew so that they'd know Jughead was in charge here. That didn't make the cool air any less of a relief, and it didn't mean that Jughead suddenly appearing over him and ripping his shirt off was any less _hot_.

"Oh my god," Archie managed, voice hoarse.

"Who cares what I do with him?" Jughead said. He balled up part of the ripped shirt and forced it into Archie's mouth. Archie gave him a betrayed look. That tasted _gross_ , all rough on his tongue, and sure, maybe it was also making Archie hard, but that didn't mean Archie had to like it.

"As long as he doesn't talk," Jughead said, with a raise of his eyebrows, "doesn't spread tales all over the North Side, plays a good boy when he's with us, sits and begs and rolls over when I want him to -- then who cares?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: a ball and chain, the Ballad of Jason & Polly, a very brief discussion of bro culture.


	3. Chapter 3

On Saturday afternoon they gave Archie lunch and turned the heat down, and even dragged him to the trailer's tiny bathroom so he could pee and shower. Joaquin supervised that last one, looking Archie up and down appreciatively. 

"Can I get some privacy?" Archie said, wondering when the humiliation was finally going to end.

"No," said Joaquin. 

The other one -- Ricky -- popped his head in and said, "Jesus H., if Red doesn't hurry up then I'm gonna stick his head in the toilet."

Ricky didn't like him, Archie realized. Joaquin at least seemed to appreciate him now that he was shirtless. And there were two girls, Diana and Spits, laughing in the kitchen. They were there to kick Archie in the teeth if he tried to run again. As far as Archie could tell they had pretty much no opinion on him at all.

For girls that was weird. But then these were Serpent girls. Maybe they didn't work the same way Riverdale High girls did. After Archie was out of the shower, it was the girls who dragged in a huge iron ball, like something out of a medieval torture dungeon, and actually chained it to Archie's ankle to keep him in the living room.

"Where did you even get this?" Archie demanded, while Joaquin and Ricky hooted in the kitchen.

"Riverdale's own haunted mansion," Jughead said, opening the door to the trailer. Vegas and Hot Dog were yapping happily at his heels. "The Blossom residence. Where else?"

Archie gaped at him. Then Jughead's friends surrounded him and there was a flurry of excited talking. Ricky wanted to know if Digger was going tough on him again, and Joaquin wanted to remind him something about the drive-in, and Diana and Spits had their own things they were worried about.

"Obviously. Next Tuesday, with I guess Mayor McCoy. No. Yes," Jughead said, taking each one in order. Then he jerked his chin at the door. "Out. Rick -- take the dogs, will you?"

To Vegas' credit, he put up a fight, clearly understanding that Ricky was a fry thief and a mortal enemy to his master. Ricky hauled him away after the other Serpents, scowling at Archie the whole time. 

"You're, uh, really popular," Archie said, when the Serpents had gone and it was just him and Jughead. "Probably because you're the leader and stuff, but they seem like they actually like you."

"It beats being alone and friendless on the North Side, which I was," Jughead noted. 

Then he was walking up to Archie and straddling him on the couch. His dick brushed Archie's and even through the layers of their jeans, it felt good. He put a hand to Archie's chest and gently traced his nipple. Tipped Archie's head back and kissed him.

Archie had kissed Veronica at a party, Val at a rehearsal, and Betty in a disastrous attempt to make up for being a bad friend to her. And he'd liked all three of those girls just fine, but the kisses -- the kisses had been rote. Like a stop along a journey, the end goal just making sure the girl liked you and felt good with you and would keep caring about you. 

This kiss was the whole point of the journey. This was it. Archie was glad it was his ankle that was chained now and his hands that were free, because that meant he could bring them up and cup Jughead's jaw, his neck. Jughead moaned a little into his lower lip.

"Fast learner, Arch," he said. "I guess there's something to your big football god who gets all the girls status now, huh?"

"I'm not--" Archie protested, breaking off. The way Jughead said _big football god_ , like he didn't think highly of it, made Archie want to protest. Also, something was occurring to Archie. 

"You lived on the North Side?"

Jughead grimaced and pulled off of him. Archie's dick protested, but it was too late. Jughead was already standing and peeling off his jacket, then retreating to the cramped kitchen and pulling a carton of milk out of the fridge. He took a swig without even putting it in a cup, then said, "We moved."

Like that was it. The whole story. But who would choose to move from the North Side to the South Side? As much as Archie wanted him back in his lap, he wanted to know about this more. It didn't really make a lot of sense.

"Was it, like, cheaper over here? Or...?"

Jughead snorted. "Yes, Archie. It was cheaper. And my dad lost his job and his share of the company, so we got evicted and needed to relocate."

"Oh," Archie said. FP Jones had definitely made the most of it, though, right? At least the Register had made it seem like that. He'd ended up masterminding a huge heroin ring that trafficked with the Canadians.

"He seems like he landed on his feet," Archie said, a little lamely.

"He landed in a bar, and in and out of AA meetings he could never commit to, and in the Serpents," Jughead said. He sounded very matter of fact about it. "He landed in jail. I don't want to talk about this."

"Sorry," Archie said.

Now Jughead was rummaging around in the kitchen. Making stovetop mac and cheese, it looked like. Archie abandoned the vague hope that he'd return to his lap and help with the raging hard-on situation Archie had, and just asked about the other thing that had peaked his curiosity.

"So you and the Blossoms. Did Cheryl, like, invite you home after you helped Jason?"

"I've never met Cheryl," Jughead said. "Just Jason."

"But you did help him," Archie said. "Him and Polly."

It was another inconsistency. Jason Blossom, _it_ boy of Riverdale High, and his beautiful blonde cheerleader girlfriend. And a Serpent. Their escape had come through this weird, hot-and-cold boy who seemed to think North Side kids were like pets he could drag home for the weekend and have a little fun with. Archie flushed, thinking of what Jughead could have done with Polly and Jason. Heck, even with just Jason. It didn't make sense, but he couldn't keep from thinking of it, from thinking that this kind of thing was maybe something Jughead Jones did all the time.

For some reason that bothered him. 

"I offered Jason a way out," Jughead said, still looking over his mac and cheese. "This town's a dead end for us Serpents. Why wouldn't it be a dead end for others? Even those mysterious, frightening Blossoms, the red-haired children of privilege, basking in their house on the hill."

He said that like he was narrating an audiobook or something. Archie blinked at him.

"Did you, like, ask for-- You know."

Jughead stared at him. 

"Seriously, Archie? That's what you want to know? Whether I had sex with Jason Blossom and Polly Cooper?"

"Well, you're going to have sex with me," Archie pointed out. 

Hopefully. 

"Maybe I won't," Jughead decided, suddenly contrary. 

"What?" Archie said. "No!"

"No?"

Okay, maybe that had come out a little desperate. 

"You got me off with your shoe," Archie said, mostly to remind Jughead of who was the really weird one here. 

Jughead sighed. After a second he brought his stovetop lunch over to the couch, clearly intending to eat all of it straight-out. Archie watched him shovel a few spoonfuls into his mouth. Jughead was apparently unbothered by the heat and by how fascinatingly gross it was for Archie to have to watch someone that slim eat that much that fast.

"She was pregnant," Jughead said eventually, talking with his mouth full. "Polly Cooper. That's confidential, but they're going to have a baby. And her mom was this battleaxe--"

"Is," Archie put in. He knew Polly and Betty's mom. She was _terrifying_.

"She put Polly in this deeply twisted horror asylum for expectant teen moms. But Jason broke Polly out and then she made him hide in the woods. And she made him ask us for help. She was really serious about getting out of this town."

Jughead sounded admiring, almost fond. He sounded the way Archie always felt when he thought about Polly's sister, Betty, like he'd met someone who could handle anything and who seemed a little bit too awesome for this world.

"I had this idea in my head," Jughead said, after a few more seconds. "A _story_ , I guess. Of the North Side and the South Side, where you were Riverdale's light and we were Riverdale's dark. And all the pain and evil of this town came from us over here. Your Riverdale, though. That was just this gossamer past. The small town people think about when they hear the term 'small town.' Everything right and cozy and good."

Archie's Riverdale was like that. Or, well. It had been like that. His mom leaving --

His mom leaving had ruined that illusion.

"Even my Riverdale has light and dark in it," Archie said. "Like most places."

Jughead shot him a sideways glance from under his lashes.

"Yeah, that's what my dad says. Said. And my dad's not right about anything, believe me, but I think he might have been right about that. Jason and Polly should have been everything good about the North Side, and it still tormented them so much that they had no choice but to run away. So. I helped them."

For some reason, Archie believed him. Jughead had been trying to do right by Jason and Polly, weirdly enough, and that was -- that was really nice. Especially from a Serpent. 

Archie said as much.

Jughead snorted. "Oh, good. The town's golden boy next door, always committed to doing the right thing, thinks I'm nice--"

"Woah, sounds like you kind of have a story you've built up in your head about me," Archie interjected. 

Jughead stopped short. Again he looked at Archie kind of sideways, looking without wanting to take the credit for looking at him.

"That's the thing about you, Archie," he murmured. "When you're right, which isn't often, you can be really spectacularly _right_."

"Hey--" Archie began, but Jughead was putting his pan of mac aside and kissing him again, so then his brain just shut down and enjoyed it. Jughead's lips on his lips, Jughead's hands back on his chest. The softness of Jughead's dark hair when Archie's hand cupped the back of his neck and crept up to take off his beanie--

"No," Jughead said firmly, pulling away. "Nuh-uh, Archie. Ground rules. That's a no."

Archie's dick was seriously straining against his jeans now. This was getting ridiculous.

"Fine," he said hurriedly. "Sorry. But can we just -- just get it on with? Like, you're still going to sleep with me, right?"

"It's not nice to pressure someone into sex, Archie," Jughead said thoughtfully.

" _Please_?"

Rolling his eyes, Jughead straddled him again.

"Yes. Obviously. You know I kidnapped you, right?"

Archie did objectively know that. Archie also objectively knew that when Jughead rolled his hips like that, it kind of didn't matter. It felt good to roll his hips back, getting Jughead just as hard as he was. It felt good to have Jughead breathing hard into his mouth between kisses. It felt good when Jughead stripped off his jeans, then cut off Archie's clothes, then encouraged Archie to wrap a hand around their dicks. The building tension, the push-pull rub of skin on skin nearly brought Archie over the edge.

And that was before Jughead got down on his knees, between Archie's knees.

"Oh my god," Archie breathed out. "Jughead. _Yes_."

"You know, Archie, I could be about to murder you," Jughead reminded him, because Jughead was a strange, strange soul who couldn't be hot without also freaking Archie out a little. But Archie could roll with that.

"Or," Archie proposed. "You could be about to do something super kind, dude."

"Super kind," Jughead repeated, rolling his eyes. But then he took Archie's cock in hand and wrapped his lips around it. He tried to take it so deep that his eyes watered, and Archie found himself reaching for the hairs at the nape of Jughead's neck again. Stroking him there and babbling nonsensical stuff like, "that's it, Jug," and "good job, Jug," like he knew Jughead or something. Jughead's mouth was hot and perfect, and pretty soon he was sliding his lips along the whole length of Archie's dick, from the base to the tip. Archie held onto him and let him, overwhelmed. This was the best anyone had ever made him feel ever, and it was Jughead Jones who was doing it. A _Serpent_.

He didn't swallow when Archie came. He kind of swished it around in his mouth like he was considering the taste, lifted up a finger to tell Archie to wait a sec, and then got up to spit it out into the wastebasket. Archie waited patiently until he came back. Jughead was still hard.

"Do you want me to? Like. With my mouth? Or my hand?" Archie asked. It was unclear whether Jughead would want Archie to do the same thing for him. He'd gotten Archie off twice now and not asked for anything. 

"Isn't this what bros do?" Jughead asked, mock-serious.

"Is it?" Archie said, not sure what that had to do with anything.

"How should I know?" Jughead said. "You and I aren't bros."

He leaned back on the couch in front of Archie, his skinny legs spread. Archie swallowed hard. He figured Jughead was giving him permission to just give him a handjob or something, but that didn't seem fair. Not after Jughead had basically done totally obscene things with his mouth, things Archie kind of wanted him to repeat before the weekend was over. 

So Archie ended up stroking the base with his hand and closing his mouth over the tip. It was hot and hard, and he sucked it the way he thought he might like it, making sure it was really good and wet. Jughead had no compunctions about grabbing Archie's hair and egging him on, but Archie kind of liked it. He'd seen nice Jughead and brittle Jughead, total asshole Jughead and popular Jughead. This Jughead was just -- just a kid who gave Archie the impression that he really, _really_ couldn't believe his good luck. So much sudden good luck, falling in his lap in such a weird way, that he didn't know what to do with it.

So that made two of them.

-

The funny thing about casual sex, Archie discovered, was that you could get pretty good at pleasing somebody in a really short amount of time if you just concentrated.

Having someone who was finicky and sarcastic and a talker when you got him going -- someone like Jughead -- that definitely helped. Jughead had a lot of ideas about what two guys could do. Some really weird. Some just inventive. He was definitely smarter than a lot of the kids Archie knew. He just didn't seem to get normal boundaries. If Archie even dared to point out that the whole situation was bizarre, Jughead would say something like, "Right, Arch. Next time I hold you hostage I'll make sure to make it as normal as possible."

"Next time?" Archie said, and hoped he sounded more worried than excited about it.

"Let's just make sure we get as much as we can out of our system this time," Jughead advised.

This plan, Archie realized, made perfect sense and also was totally fine. He'd kind of stopped worrying about Jughead killing him around the second time Jughead casually jerked him off. 

The third time Jughead did this (after another blowjob each, after Archie had jerked him off twice, after another round of milk and mac and cheese, this time one Jughead shared) someone banged on the door.

That someone was Digger, who apparently just courtesy-banged. He let himself in right after doing it. Jughead looked over his shoulder at him and cursed, then took his hand away. Archie didn't see _why_. Jughead had been fine with publicly claiming him before.

"I didn't see any of that hand-in-underpants nonsense just now," Digger told Jughead as he picked up Jughead's jeans and tossed them at the boys. "Because when I head up the river to talk to your dad, I want to be able to say you're not acting like a damn fool."

"Why?" Jughead said, with a weird, angry little twitch. "He'd know fools."

But he pulled on his pants. Digger sat down in the easy chair across from the couch and looked at the fish on the wall until they were done, then fixed his gaze back on Jughead.

"You and me, we both know that's no way to talk about your old man," he said slowly.

Jughead scowled.

"No talking--"

"--in front of your chow-chow," Digger said smoothly. "Got it. Maybe we can head out and get some air once you get a damn shirt on, Jughead."

Jughead's scowl deepened, extended, took on whole new layers Archie had never imagined a scowl could have. He pulled his shirt on and was out of the trailer with a bang. Digger followed. Neither of them even looked at Archie. Though it was evening by now and there wasn't much light left, Archie could see their shadows stopping just outside the trailer's narrow windows. He tried to get closer to see through the blinds, but the very literal ball and chain that was still tied to his ankle wouldn't let him.

But they'd turned the heat down. So now he could hear Jughead and Digger through the thin trailer walls.

"--and Blossom," Digger was saying. "Come on, Jug. You don't watch out, they'll get you like they got your old man."

"I know," Jughead said flatly. "I have my own way--"

"You think Mustang won't pin it all on you either way," Digger said, "then you've really got no call to label FP the fool."

"I never asked for this," Jughead said, sounding frustrated. "I never _wanted_ him to--"

"May not be what you want, but this is what you've got," said Digger. "You gonna step up and do what you need to?"

Then he dropped his voice and said something, and the next thing Archie knew Jughead was banging his way back into the trailer. He didn't even look at Archie. He just pulled on his jacket, the curving snakes stamping a grim, foreboding _S_ right on his back.

"Where are you going?" Archie said immediately. "Dude, you can't go to that -- that heroin deal or whatever. That's _illegal_."

It was such a bad idea. And Jughead was only, like, sixteen or seventeen. Archie's age. He didn't deserve to go to jail over something stupid like this. 

"I'm a Serpent," Jughead said, without turning around. "Illegal comes with the territory. Illegal's where I belong, Archie."

Then he left, slamming the door after him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: Teen Serpent Sharing Hour.


	4. Chapter 4

Sunday morning, Archie woke up to someone clattering pans in the tiny kitchen.

Jughead. Jughead back, not arrested. Jughead back, with his left eye bruised black and blue to match Archie's.

"Jughead," Archie said, sitting up and pushing off the ratty throw he'd been using to cover himself. "Your face, dude. What happened?"

Jughead ignored him. He was making some kind of oven pizza that had all his attention.

"Jughead," Archie repeated. "Come on, man. Just tell me what was going on--"

Jughead stopped and looked at him. The look was definitely more of a glower, to take from the word-of-the-day calendar Betty had given Archie last year.

"We're not friends," he told Archie. "You and me? We're light and dark, day and night, very good and very definitely pretty bad--"

"So are my friends Betty and Veronica, and they're friends," Archie pointed out.

" _We're not friends_ ," Jughead said. 

"Okay," Archie said simply. "That still doesn't mean I like seeing you with a shiner."

He wasn't expecting that to make Jughead shudder. It did. Not a big shudder. More something Jughead probably hardly noticed he was doing. 

"You guys do some pretty bad stuff," Archie continued, pretending he hadn't seen it either. "But, for the record? You don't seem all that bad."

"What would you know about it?" Jughead asked tonelessly. 

Then he went back to ignoring Archie and fixing up his pizza. 

People said Jughead Jones was exactly like his dad. Ever since FP had gone to jail a few months ago, it seemed like all anyone could gossip about was the younger, meaner FP waiting in the wings. 

Because FP had taken twenty years and not dropped a single bit of information about his heroin ring. According to the Register, the Feds got zero evidence out of him. And then, once he was put away, the deals and the midnight shootings, the overdoses all over town -- they actually got _worse_. Serpents started encroaching on the North Side, even sometimes the most exclusive parts of it, like the hills where the mansions were. And so people said that it couldn't have been FP who was really in charge. It had to be his kid, shadowy and sinister, who happily let his dad take the fall and then kept right on doing business. The Register had even done some digging and published an expose: Forsythe Pendleton Jones III, juvenile delinquent and miscreant, convicted arsonist, danger to the town.

Only all of that was. Well. _Bullshit_. Because Jughead had apparently helped Jason and Polly for no reason. And pulled a nerdy, ridiculous medieval implement from the bowels of the Blossom mansion. And ate like he was starving all the time. And was perfectly nice to dogs. And had given Archie some really great blowjobs.

Plus, so far, he didn't really seem like he was all that into the whole heroin thing.

'You didn't shoot up, right?" Archie said. "Like, you said you didn't want to. And that's not healthy, man--"

"Thank you, walking D.A.R.E. pamphlet, I think I know more about the dangers of heroin than you," Jughead said, annoyed. "God, Archie. When you routinely have to inject some of your friends with Narcan, then maybe you and I can have this conversation."

Archie blinked at him.

"Really?" he said.

That was -- that was awful. Archie knew the other Serpent kids didn't like him much, and he didn't really know them, but that didn't mean he wanted to think of any of them almost dying of an overdose. Handsome Joaquin and irritable Ricky, or Diana and Spits with their long nails and their wicked laughter.

"You haven't met them," Jughead put in, like he could read Archie's mind. "Toni, she's in rehab. Thank god. Bingo split town two weeks and I don't know where he is. He'll turn up. Hopefully. And Danny -- Danny we didn't get to in time."

He said that with zero emotion. Archie kind of thought that meant the emotion was too bad to let slip. 

"I'm sorry, dude--"

"That doesn't help and you don't need to say it."

"But I _am_ \--"

Jughead let his pizza dish clatter on the kitchen counter. 

"And what's the follow-up?" he asked irritably. "Asking me, 'so why deal?'"

Well, yeah, that was the next question. Only now Archie wasn't so sure he should ask it. Surely Jughead didn't like the money that much. Honestly, it kind of seemed like Jughead wasn't making that much money. He lived in a run-down trailer, survived on frozen food, and clearly didn't earn enough to buy more than one hat. So Archie was having some trouble seeing the plus side to his whole drug kingpin thing. Also, based purely on knowing Jughead for like two days, Archie could already tell that Jughead was _bad_ at being a gangster.

"It used to be just weed," Jughead muttered, after a few quiet seconds. He didn't offer ay more explanation than that, so Archie held back his urge to point out that dealing weed was also illegal. 

Jughead cut the pizza in half and brought some over to Archie. Brought a soda over too. 

"I'll eat in my room," he said abruptly. Then he went into the bedroom and left Archie staring after him. 

-

Jughead's friends showed up later in the morning, bearing dogs and switchblades and the keys to Archie's chains and more food from Pop's. Archie wasn't sure whether to be happy to see them or not. 

"Time for another shower, Remember the Titans," sniggered Diana, as Joaquin lounged on the easy chair and blatantly admired Archie's body, hardly covered by the throw. Spits cooed over Vegas as Vegas jumped happily around Archie's legs. 

Ricky flicked his colorless eyes at Archie sitting there alone on the couch, smirked, and went straight to the bedroom, Hot Dog at his heels. Archie could hear him rapping on the door and saying, "Jug. Hey, Jug. He wants you. Hasn't stopped whining, man."

"They share custody," Joaquin explained, with a raise of his eyebrows like this was significant. 

Oh. 

_Oh._

"So he and Ricky. They were --"

The girls burst into laughter. Joaquin waggled his eyebrows again as if to confirm it. And Archie -- Archie suddenly felt so jealous he almost couldn't think straight. The jealousy just swelled up in him, a big suffocating balloon. 

"I'll watch Red this time," Ricky said, swaggering back into the room. "We don't need you making eyes at him, Joaquin. I bet his Bulldog High ego's big enough as it is."

"The school is Riverdale High," Archie said, testy. "The Bulldogs are the football team."

"Yeah, I always wanted to ask about that," Ricky said easily. "Why do _you_ get to be Riverdale High? Ain't we Riverdale too?"

Archie opened his mouth to make a retort, and then discovered that he didn't have one. Ricky kind of had a point. 

Which didn't make it any easier to shower with Ricky looking like he wanted to use Archie's abs for target practice. Ricky was smaller than he was, sure, but Mustang was smaller too and he'd still been nasty about knocking Archie out the first time. Serpents fought dirty, and Ricky wasn't even the only Serpent here. He had three friends and an ex-boyfriend to back him up. 

Really, that was what bothered Archie. He'd been sort of pretending that neither he nor Jughead had any history. After yesterday's makeouts and blowjobs and all, it had made sense to. That hadn't happened between Archie Andrews, Riverdale High Bulldog, and Jughead Jones, South Side Serpent. Because those two people could never enjoy the taste of each other, or laugh about knocking their teeth together, or fantasize about touching each other's hair. So they had to be two kids without any particular past, just dropped into each other's lives by happy accident or something. 

But Jughead -- he did have a history. With someone who wasn't Archie. Someone he shared a dog with. Someone who got to see a whole different side of him, maybe. Maybe not. But maybe. And the maybe was enough to make Archie green with envy. 

He had the uncomfortable, unhappy thought, too, that maybe this was what Betty and Veronica felt like about him. All the time.

When his shower was over and he'd peed, Ricky called Diana over to watch him towel off, then slid into Jughead's bedroom. It took a lot for Archie not to just follow after him and stop what -- whatever they were doing. 

But Diana had her switchblade out and was eyeing him like she knew what he was thinking, so Archie stayed put. Behind the leather and bouffant hairdo and snake tattoos around her throat, he could detect a Cheryl Blossom-like iron. Archie was probably one of the few people at his school who wasn't scared of Cheryl, but he recognized that girls like Cheryl were girls you wanted to mess with as little as possible.

Anyway, Ricky came back out soon enough. He threw some clothes at Archie's head. A gray henley and some jeans. The jeans were too long, but the henley fit fine. It was all so ragged and worn, though, that Archie wondered why Jughead hadn't thrown it out. Maybe these were the clothes he kept around for house guests. House guests he slept with. 

When Spits was done locking Archie back into place by the couch, Ricky said, casually, "Guess you would want to have some fun now that your girl's been gone a few weeks."

Joaquin straightened so fast he almost fell off the easy chair, and Spits seemed to have accidentally swallowed her gum, but Archie just stared at Ricky.

"What are you talking about?"

"Older woman," Ricky said, casual. "I think one of your teachers."

Ms. Grundy. They knew about Ms. Grundy? Something in Archie froze up. 

"How did you--"

"Hey, I think we'd know what she was getting up to, since we're the ones forced her out of town," Ricky sniggered. 

"You _what_?" Archie said.

"Rick," Diana said warningly. Ricky ignored her, still laughing into the collar of his leather jacket.

"Making out with you in cars," he continued. "Weekends down by Sweetwater River. No wonder Jug could tell you'd be up for it--"

Archie lunged for him. He got the satisfaction of seeing Ricky look panicked, but it was only for the half-second it took for Ricky to back away far enough that Archie just ended up slamming into the floor. He was still chained up. 

Ms. Grundy had been the first person after his mom had left to give him attention. Affection. Even Betty and Veronica hadn't bothered to sit and talk with him the way she had, too busy being half-interested in him, half-interested in the way they could make pursuing him a seamless part of their opposites-attract friendship. 

So forget jealousy. He was _pissed_.

"Jughead!" he shouted, as he picked himself up from the floor. "Jughead!"

Jughead's friends looked at each other warily.

"Dude. Shut up," Joaquin hissed.

Archie didn't. After a few more yells, Jughead came out, rubbing his eyes like he'd been sleeping. 

"Geraldine Grundy," Archie said without preamble. "You forced her out of _town_ , you sick, twisted _criminal_ \--"

Jughead shot a thunderous look around at his friends, but he didn't deny it. Instead he said, "You mean Marnie Lowenstein? Or. Wait. No. It was Jennifer Gibson, actually."

Archie stared at him. Jughead turned on his heel and walked back to his room. So Archie started yelling his name again, even though this time Joaquin and Spits both tackled him to try and get him to stop.

"Off him," Jughead said, when he came back. "Off."

When Joaquin and Spits were off, Jughead threw two things in Archie's face. IDs. 

"Not that the name matters," he said as he did it. "A cougar's a cougar."

Archie didn't understand. One of these IDs was for a Marnie Lowenstein. One was for a Jennifer Gibson. Both had Ms. Grundy's face.

"She lied to you," Jughead said, short about it. "Geraldine Grundy was a sweet old lady who died a few years ago. Marnie Lowenstein -- which was her name when she lived in Albany -- was a domestic abuse survivor who relocated and left behind just enough identifying information for your Grundy to snag. And Jennifer Gibson -- honestly, she might actually have _been_ Jennifer Gibson. But who even knows."

"I met her," Joaquin put in now, voice low. "It was -- she was pretty forward. And very not my type."

"She tried to -- I mean. With _you_?" Archie said. Something in him felt scraped up and bruised suddenly, which was stupid. He hadn't even known Ms. Grundy for that long. Even if he had been mopey and depressed after she'd left him, that was just because she'd left him like he meant nothing. 

"It wasn't just you," Jughead put in now. "She'd make eyes at anybody she thought was young and vulnerable and good-looking, Archie. That was her thing. I saw her do it a thousand times."

"How?" Archie demanded.

"Serpents see a lot more than you think. People always do when they're on the outside," Jughead said. All his friends nodded, even Ricky. 

"When you're outside things, when people don't want to see you," Jughead said. "You hardly matter, Archie. I wonder if you know what that is? You're nothing. Just the quiet eyes that take note of this town. That notice the dissatisfied Jason Blossoms. The secretly wild Polly Coopers. The Grundys. You went down to Sweetwater River because you'd thought you'd be alone. Well, guess what? We're _always_ alone. We don't have parents who give us curfews or teachers who care when we don't show up. We're free to go down to Sweetwater River, too."

He said this all challengingly, in his audiobook voice again, like this wasn't _sad_. Everything about this just made the scraped-up feeling in Archie worse. Ms. Grundy hadn't been what he thought. She'd left him because he was nothing to her. And he wasn't even the only one she was probably doing that to -- probably some South Side kids had gotten tangled up in it, so the only people who'd known to try and scare her away were South Side kids. Which was another bad thing, really, because even if she'd been horrible Archie had liked her, and he didn't like the thought of Jughead doing something bad to her.

"Did you beat her up?" he demanded. "Drag her in here and threaten her?"

Jughead actually looked shocked. He opened his mouth, and then nothing came out, like he couldn't believe Archie would accuse him of that. But obviously Archie could. He liked Jughead, he thought Jughead was hot, sure. But Jughead was still a South Side Serpent.

It was Ricky who actually spoke up.

"No," he said, sounding as bemused as Jughead looked. "We're not idiots, man. Bunch of bad kids from the wrong side of the tracks try to beat up a nice lady who teaches at Riverdale High? Come on, man. None of us want to go back to juvie." 

"I told her I'd make out with her," Joaquin put in. "Then I did, and Jug took pictures. Then the girls brought some copies over to her house and told her what her options were."

"She tried to tell us her real name was Marnie and she'd been beat up by her guy and now she couldn't help wanting affection," Spits said, rolling her eyes. "Like everybody who's been beat up by their ex can't help but take advantage of people. I practically clawed her eyes out. We're not _all_ monsters."

"Plus," said Diana, "We knew she was lying, 'cause I'd broken into her car and the ID from her car said she was Jennifer Gibson."

Archie blinked around at all of them, at their scruffy leather and bruised knuckles, their weird friendly way of looking supportively at each other but only ever meeting his eyes for the barest of seconds. He couldn't figure out if these were kids who wanted to be snakes, or kids who just couldn't help it, who'd landed in the Serpents and made the best of it. They sounded weirdly proud of forcing Grundy away, like they'd been dying to tell somebody outside the group for a while, but hadn't had anybody to tell. 

"I liked her," was all he ended up telling them. "Maybe that makes me stupid--"

Ricky snorted, but Joaquin shrugged and said, "We all like people we shouldn't, man."

He was looking pointedly at Jughead when he said it, and Jughead said, "Okay, you know what? Now that we've all shared our feelings--"

Someone pounded on the door. 

Not Digger. Digger had pounded once and then let himself in, comfortable about it. This was a persistent, vicious thudding. Over and over and over. 

"Jones!" came Sheriff Keller's voice. "I know you're in there. Get out here, Jones, and maybe it'll go easier for you."

Jughead practically snarled. The others all reacted with varying degrees of panic. The coolest heads were Spits and Ricky, who were sitting on either side of Archie in seconds, positioned to hide the ball and chain. Ricky's hand clamped over Archie's mouth. Spits shifted a little bit, and then the tip of a knife was pressed into Archie's lower back.

Archie knew he was meant to be intimidated, but he was mostly just annoyed. He wasn't going to yell for the sheriff to free him or anything. He'd had like all night and most of the morning to yell for help, and he _hadn't_. 

When all the other Serpents were ringed around Archie, ready to shut him up in seconds if necessary, Jughead coolly opened his door a crack.

"Sheriff."

"That's a shiner. Somebody did a number on you," Archie heard Sheriff Keller say. 

Jughead said nothing. 

"I have a complaint from Hiram Lodge. Seems someone was up on his property--"

"I wasn't aware the Twilight drive-in already belonged to him," Jughead said. "That deal hasn't been signed yet. It's public land, and the period for public comment is still running."

"Don't give me lip," said Sheriff Keller. "I'm talking about the property that ends at the base of Manor Hill. His house, boy. Seems like we're getting a lot of complaints about suspicious characters at Thornhill, at Lodgecrest. Only this one matches your description."

Even in profile, turned so that he was wedged between the door and the wall, Archie could tell that Jughead's mouth was thinning. 

"So I assume you have a warrant for my arrest?" he said.

"Don't make this harder on yourself, boy--"

"That's a no. Have a nice day," Jughead said. He moved to close the door.

Archie sneezed.

It was a complete accident. He didn't even know if humans could sneeze on purpose. He certainly couldn't. But all the Serpents reacted with looks of betrayal, except for Spits, who reacted by digging her knife in a little, and Jughead, who didn't react at all.

"Who's in here?" the Sheriff demanded. 

He pushed his way in. Jughead was saying, in a cool tone, "You don't have a warrant to come in and you don't have my consent--"

" _Archie_?" said Sheriff Keller disbelievingly.

Archie was friends with his son. Sheriff Keller knew Archie. Sheriff Keller knew Archie had very little reason to hang out in a trailer on the South Side. 

"Get away from him," he told the Serpents. "Now."

None of them complied until he reached for his gun and Jughead, shaking his head behind him, said, "Do it."

"But--" Ricky began.

"Do it," Jughead snapped.

They moved away. Archie was left sitting alone on the couch, ankle still tethered to a very large, very suspicious-looking iron ball.

Sheriff Keller said, "What the _hell_ is going on here--"

"This is my ball," Archie said quickly.

It was the first thing that came into his head. Sheriff Keller stared at him. 

"I, uh, I brought it with me," Archie said. "To trade for a Serpents jacket. For my Bulldog initiation."

"What?" said the Sheriff, looking dumbfounded.

"I have to show that an ordinary person can't get out of it," Archie said. "If I show that, I get a jacket."

" _Might_ get a jacket," Jughead said quickly. "We haven't promised anything."

Archie shot him a dirty look. Honestly, if he was lying to the police, he figured he should at least get the jacket. Lying to the police practically made you a Serpent, right? It was definitely the worst thing Archie had ever done. 

"Son, Jones doesn't need that, trust me," Sheriff Keller said. "Twisted kid like him? You don't want to know what he could do with that--"

"Aren't you not supposed to barge in here like this?" Archie said.

That just slipped out, colder than he'd ever heard his own voice sound before. Because okay, yeah, he himself had said Jughead was twisted a few minutes ago. But in the Sheriff's mouth, it sounded worse.

Sheriff Keller gave him a heavy look. It made the hairs on the back of Archie's neck stand up. But Archie didn't take back his question.

"My mistake, then," said the Sheriff slowly. "Archie, I'll be notifying your dad about this."

Then he walked out, slamming the door behind him. He left all the Serpents staring at Archie.

"What?" Archie said.

Okay. Maybe not _what_? Maybe something more like: _see, Jughead, I_ can _be cool_ , which was bizarre because up until this moment he hadn't realized he wanted Jughead to think he was cool. Say he was cool.

"Leave," Jughead said instead.

"I'm tied to a big iron ball--" Archie protested.

"Not _you_ ," Jughead practically snarled. "Everyone else. We're moving you to the bedroom and then they're going."

"Why-- oh. The bedroom?" Archie said. 

Hopeful.

Things weren't going to be great once the Sheriff told his dad. But maybe things could be great right now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: sex and danger!


	5. Chapter 5

Archie had no sooner been cuffed to the bed and the Serpents had no sooner gone before he got an armful of tense, electric Jughead.

Kissing him deep. Archie kissed back as Jughead tried to pull up the shirt he'd lent him. They discovered that the cuffs were in the way. With a curse and a flick of his switchblade, Jughead cut the whole shirt off. 

That was still really hot.

"So," Archie said. "Sex-sex now. Right? Like real sex."

Jughead stopped running his hands down Archie's chest long enough to look extremely pained.

"I'm into it," Archie said quickly. "I mean, I want it--"

"Got that," Jughead said.

"No, I know technically I'm your hostage, but even if I weren't--"

"Archie," Jughead said. "I _got it_."

Well, he might get it, but Archie was still trying to wrap his head around it. Everything about Jughead seemed like it belonged on some better, stranger planet: his wry remarks, his oddly steady hands, his long long lashes. He and Archie definitely didn't fit together, except that they totally did. He'd abducted Archie, and somehow that turn of events had ended up working out fine.

Kidnapped by fate.

"What?" Jughead said.

"What?" said Archie. Had he said that out loud?

"You just sang at me," Jughead said. He eased off Archie's chest and looked down at him, befuddled.

"I'm into music," Archie explained.

"Since when?" Jughead demanded.

"Since two months ago," Archie said. "Anyway, sometimes my head just comes up with these lyrics--"

"Oh boy," Jughead said. "You know what? I have a better idea for your mouth than you singing."

"I'm not that bad--" Archie began, but he was cut off by Jughead descending again.

The lyrics part of his brain shut off. Everything else woke up, enjoying the feeling of Jughead's mouth on his. Jughead kissed a stripe down his neck, then started sucking there, hungry and possessive. Archie brought his free hand up to the strip of skin on Jughead's back that peeked out from under his jacket and rubbed him there, encouraging him.

Jughead broke off eventually. 

"We should be naked," he informed Archie, and set about making that happen. Archie let him do it. The weird benefit to being handcuffed was how much it seemed to put Jughead in the driver's seat. Jughead handled that the same way he handled all leadership: gingerly, at arm's length. More or less knowing what he was supposed to do, but the tiniest bit surprised that he was allowed to do it.

"You're doing fine," Archie told him encouragingly, as Jughead worked at pulling off the ragged jeans he'd lent him.

Jughead stopped and stared at him for a second. It was like something had fallen away and all Archie saw was naked fondness. Which was weird, because Jughead didn't even know him well enough to be fond of him. 

Jughead opened his mouth to say something, probably something sarcastic, and then seemed to think the better of it.

"Thanks, Archie," he said instead. Then he finished stripping Archie down, bent his head, and took Archie's dick in his mouth again.

That was never not going to be awesome. And not just the feeling. The sight. The way Jughead's lashes fanned out as he closed his eyes, the way his wide mouth fit around the tip of Archie's cock. Everything intense and in control and personal. Archie had always been pretty casual about hooking up with people. Jughead was clearly the opposite: focused and hungry from beginning to end. 

It wasn't the blowjob that made Archie lose it. It was how during the blowjob Jughead reached over and grabbed something from his nightstand. He uncapped it and reached a hand back, started fingering himself. Lube. He was preparing himself with lube. So he wanted _Archie_ to -- to --

Just the promise made Archie come with a yell. This time it did get in Jughead's mouth and he sat back, making a face. He scooped some off his tongue and looked at it like he wasn't sure he trusted it.

"Sorry," Archie said quickly. "I--"

Jughead bent down and kissed him again, made Archie taste himself on his tongue. Archie & Jughead, Jughead & Archie. It made Archie's head spin. 

"Let me take care of you," he managed, when Jughead broke off. Jughead was doing, like, all the work here. 

"I haven't needed anyone to do that for a while, pal," Jughead said, like the very suggestion was insulting to him. But he was reaching for something else on the nightstand and then Archie heard a click. 

It took him a second to understand. The cuffs. Jughead had undone the cuffs. Archie brought his wrist down and massaged it. Jughead looked tense and uncertain for a moment. 

"Thanks," Archie said simply. "For trusting me."

Then it was his turn to kiss Jughead, filing away how surprise made Jughead a little more pliable, a little easier to flip on his back and kiss senseless. 

"Jesus," Jughead managed, between kisses. "Jesus. Humans need air, Arch--"

"Do you have to be sarcastic?" Archie said, rolling his eyes. Not that it bothered him. Jughead was who Jughead was. "How do you want-- you know--"

Jughead briefly became very serious. "Inside me," he said. "I have zero interest in forcing an alpha dog football bro to go against his private codes of masculinity."

"Have you _met_ me?" Archie said. "Alpha dog? Come on, dude."

He knew Jughead had only known him for this weekend, but a part of him still assumed Jughead should know him better than that.

Jughead looked away, biting his lip. 

"Inside me because I want it that way, then," he said, almost too casually. "I suppose it can't hurt to be honest about what I want with you. _You're_ not a Serpent."

For a second, Archie wanted to argue that he'd met Jughead's friends and he was pretty sure they'd do anything for him, and for some of them 'anything' probably included _that_. But he kept quiet. He didn't really know how the Serpents worked, how the outsider band of the younger Serpents could coexist with Digger's gruff no-nonsense and Mustang's venom.

So he just helped Jughead prepare himself. For a good ten minutes they were wordless and physical, Archie crooking a finger inside him and stretching him, Jughead responding in exhales and moans. Archie had never done this before. But Jughead was so vocal that it was surprisingly easy to figure out what worked for him. Doing it right earned him Jughead arching slightly off the bed, Jughead shuddering a little. A flush across Jughead's cheekbones that Archie liked, that Archie chased gently with the fingers of his free hand.

He didn't lube himself up until Jughead was totally hard, making needy little sounds. Briefly, Archie wondered if anyone could hear them through the thin walls of the trailer. They'd probably think Archie was the one undone. Archie found that he didn't mind that. He suddenly didn't want anyone to know that he could do this to Jughead, that he had this with Jughead. This was theirs, and at least it gave Jughead a place where he could be this nakedly vulnerable.

One finger. Then two, next to one of Jughead's. He seemed eager to be looser, eager to be filled. Archie had half a mind to tell him to take it easy except that he'd just be sarcastic about it. So Archie made sure he was as loose as they could get him, working his lubed-up fingers inside, enjoying how Jughead responded to the teasing in-out stroke of Archie's knuckles on the rim of his hole. 

He took his free hand and put it on Jughead's cock, too. Working him from both sides, until Jughead gasped out, "Archie, if you don't get inside--"

Like Archie needed an invitation to do the one thing Archie really wanted to do.

He lined himself up between Jughead's legs. The head of his cock still looked too big next to Jughead's hole, somehow, and Archie spared a second to worry about that before Jughead locked his legs around him and said, half-annoyance and half-need, " _Archie_."

He was still so tight it almost hurt to slide the head inside him. His back arched up again, and his chest rose and fell like he was breathing hard. Archie rubbed his stomach a little, panicky, connecting one beauty mark to another.

"You okay?" he whispered. "Juggie? Are you okay?" 

Jughead was a sweet tunnel of heat around his dick, and he wasn't even inside him fully. But it wasn't worth it if Archie was hurting him.

Jughead just opened his eyes, looking wondering for a moment. Then he said, low, "It's okay, Archie. Come on."

So Archie kept going. He kept it slow until he bottomed out inside Jughead, gasping at the perfect, tight heat. Then he leaned forward and kissed Jughead. Jughead's hands came up and cupped his jaw, eager. 

"More," he said. "Come on, Archie. Fuck me."

Archie did, but he didn't stop kissing him, sucking along his jaw. He worked his hips in and out of Jughead, getting a good thrust going. Once or twice he managed to almost pull out all the way, just to get the good feeling of his dick head teased by Jughead's hole. But for the most part he didn't do that, because Jughead seemed to like it best when Archie was in him deep. 

And he really liked it when Archie scraped a particular spot inside him.

"Oh my god," he moaned into Archie's mouth. "There. There, Archie."

So Archie tried again. Tried and tried and tried, and every try was awesome, driving him deeper into Jughead and making Jughead hold him tighter, more possessively. Jughead grabbed his hand and directed it to his dick, trapped between them and leaking pre-come. Archie jerked it in time with his thrusts, wanting Jughead to come first.

"Would you keep me?" he whispered, when Jughead was kissing along his jaw. "If you could?"

"Yes," Jughead said, more a sob than any kind of real word. "Archie. Archie, _yes_."

When he came, his ass clenched around Archie's dick. Archie almost came too. He was breathing out a prayer of thanks that Jughead had come first when Jug's hands closed on his ass, encouraging him to thrust harder.

"Let's finish you off, Archie," he said. "Come on."

So, almost sobbing himself, Archie came inside him. He was sticky and brutally satisfied, feeling luckier than he had in ages, luckier than he had when they'd let him onto the Bulldogs. He curled on top of Jughead after he'd pulled out. Jughead took the scraps of the henley and cleaned off their stomachs, and then his hands found Archie's biceps and massaged them lightly. Archie kissed his jaw again, just because he could, and wondered if Jughead would let him fall asleep here.

The weekend wasn't technically over, right?

Beneath him, Jughead shook a little. Archie looked down at him, concerned. Jughead was laughing. He thought Jughead was laughing.

"I'm clean, by the way," Jughead said.

"Oh," Archie said. "Good. Me too."

"I figured you too, Archie," Jughead said, snorting. "You're not a Serpent."

Something occurred to Archie.

"We should have talked about that before. Right?"

Jughead looked at him wryly. So that was why he was laughing. Well, at least he could laugh about it. All Archie could think was that if his dad knew, he'd be getting an earful.

Jughead pulled him down again.

"I was too eager," Jughead whispered into his ear. "A manly, football god North Sider like you? I was too eager, Archie."

Archie drifted off into sleep on top of him. Before he did, he had the weird thought that Jughead was lying about something. Manly. Football god. North Sider. None of those things were things Jughead even liked.

-

Archie woke to the sound of the heat coming on with a hiss. Jughead was asleep beneath him. Archie stayed on top of him for a few seconds, grimacing at the clanging of the pipes, the shriek of the old radiator by the bed.

And then he thought, _who's turning it on?_

"Jughead," he said. "Jughead."

It took maybe a minute to shake Jughead awake. But he got the heat thing faster than Archie had. 

"Is it your friends?"

"My friends don't mess with my trailer," Jughead said, looking furiously confused. He reached over and tried the light next to the bed. It wouldn't come on.

"Bulb's out?" Archie suggested.

"No," said Jughead. "Someone's messing with the panel outside. It controls the heat and electric." 

He was up in a flash of pale limbs, pulling his clothes on. He threw Archie a new henley, a new pair of ratty jeans. His Bulldog jacket. Archie's shoes. It felt like an eternity since Archie had last seen those.

"Listen," Jughead said, as Archie pulled his own clothes on.

Outside the bedroom, in the living room, Hot Dog and Vegas were barking furiously.

"He doesn't do that if it's just Serpents," Jughead said, shaking his head. "Someone's trying to cut the power and get in. Come on." 

He pulled Archie towards the window. Archie, half-in and half-out of his shirt, said, "I'm not leaving my dog!"

"They don't want your dog," Jughead said. "They don't want my dog. They don't even want you. They want something they think I have, but that isn't going to stop it from being bad for us if they find us in here."

Archie conquered the shirt and shrugged on his jacket.

"What's going on?" he demanded. "Why would somebody want to break into your house? And hurt you if they found you here?"

Jughead stared at him.

"Archie," he said. "I'm in a _gang_."

Okay, so that added some context. But it still didn't explain things. Archie wanted to stand his ground and figure this out, but Jughead was shaking his head at him, like he could tell that would be Archie's impulse.

"I'll tell you everything," he said, sounding a little desperate for the first time since Archie had known him. "Everything, Archie. But you have to trust me. If they do anything to Hot Dog or Vegas, we'll get them back. And I'll get Joaquin and the others to come by and check on them as soon as it's safe."

Then he was tugging Archie towards the narrow window again. It was a tight, awkward fit squeezing out of it, and the both of them almost fell on their faces. Archie was surprised at how dark it already was outside. The trailer park was desolate, the only sounds the muffled barks of the dogs and a scraping noise from the front of the trailer, like someone really was trying to get in.

Or several someones. Jughead pulled him around the side and then off behind a nearby RV, but for a second there Archie caught sight of three or four cars. A group of men at the front. Way too many people to send after a kid like Jughead. 

Then they were on a dusty road and Jughead was pulling a tarp off a green pickup truck, urging Archie to climb in.

"I thought you had a motorcycle," Archie said. "Where are we going?"

"My home away from home," Jughead said. "And I do have a motorcycle, but they'll have staked that out."

Beneath the panic over Vegas and Hot Dog and over people trying to hurt Jughead, Archie felt a twinge of disappointment that he wouldn't get to see the motorcycle.

Jughead started the truck. Its headlights lit up a wooded dirt back road, and then they were pulling away. Oddly, pulling away in the direction of the North Side, like Jughead intended to go there.

Maybe it was a night of opposites. Archie had recognized those fancy cars outside the trailer. And if Clifford Blossom and Hiram Lodge could come to the South Side, then Archie didn't see why Jughead couldn't head over to the North Side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: Jughead's story, a special task just for Joaquin, a Serpent jacket.


	6. Chapter 6

Jughead took them to Pop's. Pop greeted him with the biggest smile Archie had ever seen on the old man.

"Juggie," he said, nodding easily. "Good to see you two boys together."

Jughead just winced in reply and slid into a booth by the back door. He slouched low on the vinyl while Pop shuffled away to say something to one of the waitresses.

"They know my usual," was all Jughead said, by way of explanation. 

Then he stared at the shiny laminate table, looking slightly spooked. He didn't say anything else for a minute. The waitress came by and wordlessly left them each a cup of coffee.

"So," Archie said. "About--"

"Archie. Do you really not know?" Jughead said.

Archie stared at him.

"About why Clifford Blossom and Hiram Lodge are after you? Dude. Why would I know that?"

Jughead looked disappointed for some reason.

"Nevermind," he said. "I should have known."

"I'm not from the South Side," Archie reminded him. "I don't know what the Serpents are supposed to be getting up to."

It still took a few seconds before Jughead spoke.

"The Serpents used to deal weed," he said. "Mostly just to you Bulldogs and to your parents. Sure, sometimes my dad would catch a guy with track marks and we'd start to wonder if he was dealing more. Keeping it low-key, not telling the gang. When they did that, my dad would take their jackets. The Serpents are supposed to be about the bikes, about looking out for each other and the South Side. Maybe about some light theft. But not really about making a profit."

He grinned wryly.

"My dad," he said, shifting completely into his audiobook voice now, "was a terminal drunk who couldn't complete twelfth grade. So maybe he knew he wasn't cut out for profit. But he was this tough, charismatic former football star, always talking about his high school glory. Good at making people believe in it, when he wasn't red-eyed and slumped on the couch. So they made him the leader."

The waitress came and left Jughead a paper carton of fries. Jughead took a whole fistful, crushing them, and brought them to his mouth. After he'd chewed and swallowed, he spoke again.

"Things changed when Jason Blossom sought me out. I don't know why he did. Maybe he remembered me from when I'd lived on the North Side. Or maybe he just thought I was the best one to get him into the Serpents. Or maybe he just knew I'd listen to him."

"He wanted to get into the Serpents?" Archie said disbelievingly.

"He wanted to get away from his parents," Jughead said. "He didn't care how he did it. See, Arch, Jason had always assumed that being a Blossom, a North Sider, was a good thing. But when he broke the news to his family about Polly Cooper-- well."

He grinned. This was a new grin on him. No joy in it. Just a sardonic, snakey thing, all in the eyebrows.

"What's the classic small town story?" Jughead said, leaning forward on the laminate table. 

"A football star?" Archie guessed.

"Close," Jughead said, with a gleam in his eye. "The football star. The girl next door. And the beautiful mean girl. See, Archie, there was another girl Jason's parents wanted for him. The Lodges and Blossoms go way back. And Jason soon discovered that their business interests are tangled at the roots of a very poisonous tree."

"Ronnie's dad is a businessman," Archie protested. Ronnie was his friend.

"So is Clifford Blossom," Jughead said, shrugging. "And they happen to be in the same business."

"Maple?" 

"Heroin," said Jughead. "Clifford shipped it to Canada in his maple vats and paid a small multi-million-dollar fee to Lodge Industries to move his money around, so that a huge fortune in drugs would look like a moderate fortune in maple. A match between their children would have been a way of eventually stopping the payments. He explained this to Jason, and Jason didn't take it well. He threatened to rat Clifford out. Clifford threatened to kill his son."

" _Kill_ him?" Archie said, disbelieving. The waitress reappeared and eyed him gingerly as she set a pair of cheeseburgers in front of them. Jughead dug into his without hesitation, like a little light talk of murder was no reason to pass up a meal.

"I helped Jason get away, and it brought the Serpents to Clifford's attention," Jughead said, talking with his mouth full and very clearly not caring. "Once Jason was safe from his clutches, he decided he wanted the person who'd helped him."

"You," Archie said, stupefied.

"Me," Jughead said. He finished chewing. Swallowed. Suddenly looked brittle. 

"They took me to the Blossom mansion," he said. "I thought they were going to ask about Jason and Polly. But instead it turned out somebody had ratted on a deal Clifford's usual people had tried to make happen. So he had decided to cut ties with his usual goons and get the Serpents to work for him instead. And he wanted a Serpent to take the fall for the bad deal. What better Serpent than the one who'd helped his errant son?"

"That's why he wants you," Archie said.

Jughead shook his head.

"My dad showed up," he said. "My dad, Digger, and Mustang. Clifford decided--"

He broke off. His eyes, sea glass color behind long long lashes, were wet with sadness or fury or both.

"No," he said. "My dad decided. My dad and Clifford together. If Clifford needed a fall guy, then he had one. And taking my dad out of the picture meant the Serpents needed a leader, needed someone to step in and tell them what to do. So that was perfect for Clifford, and perfect for my dad, too."

"How is that perfect for your dad?" Archie demanded. This whole story was _horrifying_. "He's innocent, isn't he?"

"My dad's never been innocent," Jughead said, shaking his head. "He's always been a drunk. A thief. A loser."

But despite his words, Jughead was wiping his eyes furiously.

"He took the fall for Clifford," Archie said.

"Yes, Archie," said Jughead. "He took the fall because of me."

-

One burger, with Jughead, turned into two and then three. Outside, the gloom deepened. But Jughead didn't seem inclined to come to Archie's place. 

"That's the last thing you need," he said. "Go home, Archie. The weekend's over."

"It's Labor Day weekend," Archie said. "We have a whole other day. And you can't go home. Clifford Blossom and Mr. Lodge are robbing your trailer!"

"Trashing it, more like," Jughead said, rolling his eyes. "They won't find what they want. And it's been trashed before, anyway."

He wouldn't tell Archie just what it was the town's least upstanding citizens wanted. Only that it had taken many, many trips to their manor grounds and country clubs and offices to get it.

"So it's not the ball and chain," Archie decided. That was heavy, but he'd seen two or three Serpents manage that in a single trip.

"No," Jughead said, digging into a sundae despite the fact that it was way too late for him to be eating that much sugar. "That I took because he used it on me. So I didn't want him to have it."

Then he shook his head, grimacing.

"I guess he's got it back now."

"What if he shows up here?" Archie said. "What are you going to do without me?"

Jughead shot him a look that, even after only a weekend, Archie already knew was his _Archie, please_ look.

"What am I going to do _with_ you?" he said. "I can look after myself, Archie."

As if in answer to this, the Pop's door bell gave a trill. Archie started, paranoid. Worried it would be Lodge or Blossom or Mustang or all of the above. But it was only Ricky, Joaquin, Diana, and the dogs. Vegas attacked Archie joyously. Pop looked about to shout, but then Hot Dog darted across to Jughead's lap.

"Jughead," he said instead, pretty calmly for a man who was watching two health violations happen right in front of his eyes. 

"Sorry," Jughead said. He reached into the pocket of his leather jacket and deposited a crumpled mess of bills and change, not bothering to count it. Pop looked like he didn't expect or need him to. Then, with a wave at the waitress, Jughead was striding out with his crew.

"Hey!" Archie said. "Wait!"

He scrambled after him.

The Serpents were gathered in a pond of streetlight behind Pop's, among the dumpsters and recycling bins. Spits was waiting there, at the wheel of a battered blue pickup. Archie caught sight of a few things piled in the back: the easy chair, the talking fish from the wall of Jughead's trailer. A few trash bags of what looked like clothes. An only slightly chipped glass pitcher.

"They destroyed everything else," Spits told Jughead, shaking her head. "Like animals."

"When are you gonna tell us what this is about?" Ricky said.

They didn't know. The other young Serpents didn't know. It was only _Archie_ Jughead had told the whole story to. Archie felt an odd, inappropriate warmth spread through him. 

Then Vegas broke away from his heels and made straight for the Serpents and Hot Dog, eager to play with a friend.

"Come _on_ ," Ricky said, as the dogs cavorted around his legs and he caught sight of Archie. "Ain't you tired of following us around yet?"

"Following you around?" Archie said. "You kidnapped me!"

Jughead shook his head. "Go home, Archie. Go back to your yellow clapboard house. Check your pockets to make sure we haven't robbed you. It's over."

"I'm not leaving you in the lurch," Archie said. "Any of you."

"You don't have a choice," Jughead said flatly. "Come Tuesday, and it's back to pep rallies and football practice and holding Betty Cooper's hand for you. While us -- we're lying low. The way we've been for weeks at a time this summer. It'll all blow over once Lodge and Blossom remember they have everything and we have nothing, but until then? You don't want to risk what you have for _us_."

The other Serpents all nodded in grim agreement, except for Joaquin. Something in his face softened a little.

Archie caught sight of it and latched on, like Vegas with a running shoe.

"Joaquin," he said. "Joaquin. You like me."

Joaquin recoiled like Archie had just shoved a slug in his face. 

"You watched me in the shower!" Archie pointed out.

"I have eyes!" Joaquin said, looking around at his friends like he wished he could keep them from this whole interaction.

"And you have smarts too," Archie insisted. "You know I'm telling the truth when I say you guys can come to my house. My dad won't be home yet, and you can lie low there--"

He broke off. All of the other Serpents were laughing. Not Joaquin. Joaquin looked humiliated.

"Joaquin?" Diana hooted. " _Smarts_?"

"He's dumb and pretty, like you are to your friends," Spits informed Archie. 

"Okay," Jughead said. "Knock it off. Joaquin, since he likes you, see that he gets home."

Then he turned away, like Archie didn't even _matter_. Archie shouted his name, but Joaquin already had a hand on his arm. He was smaller and slimmer than Archie, but his grip was like steel.

"I swear to god, you jock," he said, shaking his head. He started tugging Archie away. Vegas followed at their heels, whining about having to leave Hot Dog.

"What's his problem?" Archie demanded. "A second ago he was telling me all his secrets, and now he doesn't even want me around?"

The worst thing was how familiar this felt after Grundy. Like Jughead was the same. Like Jughead could very easily just toss Archie away.

"This weekend. It's -- it's over for him," Archie said, and felt hot shame and anger course through him.

"It's not over 'til it's over," Joaquin said, still prodding him along the darkened street.

Archie stared at him.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Joaquin shrugged. "I don't know," he said. "Just something people say."

Then, after half a beat. "We're all rooting for Ricky, man. You've gotta know that. Rick's liked him since forever."

"They were together," Archie said.

Joaquin laughed.

"Nah, I was pulling your leg about that. Nobody's ever been _together_ with Jug. His old man used to complain about it, the way he held himself apart. Always chasing some story or wondering about his sister or his old North Side friends."

"Jason Blossom and Polly Cooper?" Archie said.

Through the dim glow of the streetlights, he could tell that Joaquin's handsome face was looking exasperated. Though Archie couldn't figure out why. 

"Hey, if he's such a loner, how come you all follow him?" Archie said.

"FP got hit with twenty," Joaquin said simply. "Half of us wouldn't have joined if we'd known we'd end up looking at Mustang on top of the pyramid. Rather have Jughead. And we know FP got framed. Jug just won't tell us how or why."

"But Mustang and Clifford have some of the Serpents following them," Archie said slowly, putting the pieces together.

Joaquin snorted. 

"They think FP was hiding some huge heroin stash Mustang liberated," he said. "If they think that, they didn't know Jug's old man. Boozer, sure. And he'd steal anything if he got in the mood for that. But FP -- FP didn't get flashy with the Serpents. To him we were family, so he could yell and knock us around to get us in line, make up dumb plans sometimes to make sure the Sheriff was off our backs. But that was it. First sign of trouble, and FP'd be the first guy handing you a bus ticket out of town. Guy like that, if he had this big hidden cash pile, he'd _share_ it."

Joaquin broke off. Considered something.

"Or set it on fire when he got drunk and angry," he admitted. "Honestly, with him it was like fifty-fifty."

Even though he was angry with Jughead, Archie found himself kind of bothered by that. It sounded like Jughead had grown up with someone a little too wild, a little too unpredictable. No wonder Jughead cycled through moods the way he did. No wonder he got prickly and brittle so easily. 

"Alright, you're home," Joaquin said, and then Archie was looking up at the lights of his own porch. Joaquin had led him straight here. Vegas bounded up the steps joyfully, and inside someone turned on a light. Two someones. Two shadows, very familiar ones.

"Archie?" said his mother. "Is that you? Oh, thank god!"

"Arch?" said his dad.

"My mom came," Archie said dumbly. "Joaquin. It's her. Come on. It's _her_."

Joaquin just turned up the collar of his jacket, like it was extra armor against the North Sideness of the Andrews, and said, "Why don't you just invite me to tea at the Sheriff's house, jock?"

He'd already strolled away by the time Archie's parents opened the door. Archie's mom came running down the steps, looking relieved. His dad followed after, trouble lines on his brow.

"Came back early," he told Archie. "Seemed like something might be up. Archie, son, we got a call from Sheriff Keller--"

"He said you were with Juggie," said his mother. "Is it true?"

Then, as she caught sight of something on Archie's back, "Oh, Archie, what did you do to your _jacket_?"

Archie pulled off his Bulldog jacket. Someone had tagged the back with silver spray-paint. A slithering, double-headed S. A snake. A Serpent's jacket. Archie stared at it, dumbfounded. 

Then something occurred to him.

"Why'd you just call him Juggie?" he asked his mother, confused.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: a secret past, someone checks Archie's pockets, someone smiles at Archie and it freaks him out.


	7. Chapter 7

Monday morning, Archie's mom pulled out the photo album.

Archie's dad said, "I'm of two minds about this," and shook his head. But he didn't stop them. 

Archie had rarely, if ever, looked at the album. It was just baby Archie. One year old Archie, with his first crop of red hair. Two year old Archie, dressed up like a superhero. Archie had never been all that interested in looking at all these Archies. 

But three year old Archie -- three year old Archie was at a barbecue, balanced on somebody's knee. Somebody whose mugshot had been plastered all over the Register this summer. 

"That's FP Jones," Archie said dumbly. 

FP's shirt said, JONES & ANDREWS: REMODELING THE HEART OF RIVERDALE.

Jughead had said, _My dad lost his job and his share of the company._

Archie grabbed the album from his mother's lap, leaving Mary blinking after him.

"Archie--"

"We knew them?" Archie demanded. He flipped the pages furiously. Four year old Archie wasn't alone either. There was a dark-haired little boy bobbing along in his wake. At Betty's birthday party. At the playground. By the lake. Always there, skinny and familiar, with sea-glass eyes and a wide mouth.

"You gave him that hat, I remember," Archie's mom said, pointing it out. "You won it at the fair. It was too big for him, but he loved it."

Jughead and Archie at a campground. At school together. In a Pop's booth. Introducing puppy Vegas to puppy Hot Dog.

On cue, Vegas' nose wormed its way into Archie's lap.

Vegas had known. Vegas had known, and Archie had been too stupid to figure it out.

"Look, I'm sorry what happened to that family," Archie's dad was saying. "God knows I told FP enough times to knock off the boozing--"

"FP was volatile," put in Archie's mom. "Troubled."

"Why didn't I remember?" Archie said. 

"Well, you were young," said his mom. "You just suddenly stopped talking about Jughead being gone in second grade, after Veronica Lodge's birthday party. I think she and Betty were fighting over you? And somehow in the scuffle you slipped and hit your head. We took you to the hospital and they said there shouldn't be lasting damage. So we left it alone."

"And that family," Fred said, shaking his head, "that family was always in some trouble or other. I started to think it was better if you didn't remember them, Arch."

Archie stared at him. That wasn't his dad speaking. That wasn't who Fred was, someone who just disregarded other people like that. 

Fred must have seen his surprise, because after a second he looked away awkwardly. 

"Look, I've felt bad for Jughead. Hard not to, with what the Register's been saying about him. But he's not my kid, Archie. You are."

"But we were close," Archie said. Picture after picture, not just of him and Jughead but of his dad and FP, his mom and a tired-looking woman with Jughead's eyes. Family vacations together. Cookouts. Sleepovers. All of it so much more normal than any part of Jughead's life now. 

"Archie, those people aren't my responsibility," his dad said flatly. "And once they moved to the South Side, they weren't my problem either. You know how many times I bailed FP out?"

There was some old anger there. Something that went beyond Archie and Jughead. It made his dad almost unrecognizable. Because Fred had always taught Archie to be good, and part of being good was doing more than you had to. Doing the right thing by people, even and especially sometimes when they weren't your responsibility.

"Archie," his dad said again. "Do you understand?"

"I think Archie's tired and has a lot to process," said his mother carefully. "Maybe you should go rest, honey."

Once, she would have backed his dad up absolutely. When she'd stopped doing that, when they'd fallen out of sync, even Archie had noticed. And had panicked. Panic at the thought of her leaving, which had morphed into panic over Grundy leaving, which had morphed into the panic last night, when he'd thought of Jughead just ending it and not caring. 

Archie had been feeling thrown away for a long, long time. 

But it wasn't him, maybe. Maybe he wasn't the reason his mom had left for Chicago. Maybe she'd signed up for something good with his dad, and it had accidentally disappointed her. A run of bad luck, the opposite of what Archie had had this weekend with Jughead. If luck could go good, then it could definitely go bad. 

"Archie," she said quietly, when he was upstairs in bed. She leaned over him and kissed him on the forehead. "Your dad's a good person, okay? He was always trying to do the best by you."

But Archie wasn't sure that made him all that happy, if the best for Archie had been the worst for Jughead.

"I think Betty's back," his mother said. "Do you want to invite her over?"

He didn't. 

"Maybe I'll just take this jacket over and see if she can figure out how to get the paint out," his mom decided. After folding Archie's Bulldog jacket over her arm, she let herself out of Archie's room. 

-

Why hadn't Jughead _told_ him, though?

He gave his punching bag a workout. He went for a run. He spent thirty minutes more punching after that. And he still couldn't figure it out. He still had no idea if he was the bigger jerk for forgetting Jughead, or if Jughead was, for not reminding Archie that they'd grown up together. 

That was why Jughead being close had felt so natural, why Jughead's sarcasm had seemed normal. Why he'd liked looking at Jughead's face. Why it had felt right to see Jughead give him a crooked smile, like he was pulling it out of an attic and dusting it off just for Archie. 

Archie knew him. Or, more accurately, Jughead knew Archie. Knew Archie lived in a yellow clapboard house, knew Archie was friends with Betty Cooper and that Archie hadn't always been on the football team. Maybe Archie was the stupid one here for not picking up on the million hints Jughead had dropped. Or maybe it wouldn't have been too hard, in between kissing Archie on the lips and wrapping his mouth around Archie's dick, for Jughead to just say it: 

Archie had been his friend, once. 

-

Eventually, when the day was winding down, he decided to text Betty. Betty had shown up in a lot of those pictures. And Betty wasn't stupid, she wasn't the kind to forget. So she'd probably know more about Jughead than he did.

But when he picked up his phone, he saw four or five missed texts from her. 

_Arch, are you home? Kev was saying some weird stuff._

_Arch, can you come to your window?_

_ARCHIE. DID YOU CHECK YOUR JACKET????_

That was really not like Betty, because she never did all-caps and she never did multiple question marks. Archie ran to the window. Betty wasn't there, so he texted her frantically until she did show up. As soon as she did, she mouthed something at him furiously. 

COME OVER HERE RIGHT NOW. 

He assumed her mom wasn't home, because Archie was pretty much banned from the Cooper household any time Mrs. Cooper was around. But he'd barely made it up the front steps before Betty's mother was opening the door, smiling at him. Archie stopped short, startled. He'd never seen Mrs. Cooper smile in his direction before, so this was actually kind of frightening. 

"Can you please stop scaring my son, Alice?" came his mother's tired voice. 

They were all gathered around the Cooper dining table. His mom. Betty's. Both their dads. And finally Betty herself, standing in front of her laptop and biting her nails anxiously. It was a sure sign that something big was happening, because usually when Betty did that her mother was the first to make her stop. But Mrs. Cooper was just pacing the room in a grand way, looking more excited than Archie had ever seen her, more excited than the time Archie had accidentally thrown a football into her yard and she'd handed it back to his dad deflated to teach the Andrews a lesson about property line boundaries.

"This is the biggest scoop the Register has seen in years. As big as Jason Blossom's disappearance. No -- bigger!"

"It's not your scoop," Betty said stubbornly. "It's Archie's."

"And Archie doesn't have a paper, so he'll gladly act as our source and let us take care of making sure the information gets to the public," Betty's mother said smoothly. 

"Hold on," said Archie's dad. "No one's making my son act as anything until we figure out what all this means. Video footage of Hiram Lodge and shady characters. Invoices that don't make sense. Clifford Blossom and the _Serpents_. This kind of thing could put a big target on our backs."

Archie stepped closer to the laptop.

There was a white flash drive attached to it. Small, innocuous. With a tiny little crown doodled on it in Sharpie. That seemed like Jughead's kind of signature.

"He was getting proof," Archie realized. 

That was why Jughead had broken into Thornhill, into Lodgecrest. That was what had brought Sheriff Keller to his door. And this -- _this_ was the thing he'd known Mr. Lodge and Clifford Blossom wouldn't find in his trailer. Wouldn't find it, because he'd slipped it into the pocket of Archie's jacket, given it to Archie.

For a second, the weight of that felt so heavy that Archie almost couldn't breathe.

"We have to tell the Sheriff. Concealing evidence is against the law," Archie's mother was saying.

"Oh please, Mary. It's not concealing if it goes up in tomorrow's headlines," said Hal Cooper. "Now let us do our jobs and get to work unraveling all this, so that Alice and I can--"

"It's Jughead's work," Archie said.

Everyone stared at him.

"It's Jughead's," Archie said. "So we have to do this right. We have to make sure it's his side of the story."

There was silence for a second. Then Betty's mother burst into laughter.

"Oh sure," she said, rolling her eyes. "Of course. Enough evidence of drug trafficking to bury the two biggest robber barons this town has ever seen, and we filter it all through the eyes of the local delinquent--"

"He's not a delinquent!" Archie insisted.

Surprisingly, Betty said the same.

"I told you not to print that stuff about him!" she said. "I asked you to. He was our friend, he used to live here--"

"Betty, the fact of that juvenile conviction was public," said her father, firmly talking over her. "We were just making sure the public was aware--"

"He knows Polly," Archie said abruptly. 

The Coopers changed. Hal looked suddenly angry, angrier than Archie had ever seen him. And Alice looked dumbfounded. Archie had definitely never seen that look on her.

"He should tell Polly to get right back here," Hal said, sounding suddenly dangerous.

"He could tell Polly whatever he wants," Archie pointed out. "He's got her and Jason's trust. So you should -- you should be careful what you print about him."

He felt like he was misbehaving somehow, threatening the Coopers like that. But he knew Betty's parents were cleverer than he was, and they could print whatever they wanted, really. They could print something that made Jughead look like the bad guy. Something unfair, that made people hate the South Side even more than they already did.

Betty put a supportive hand on his shoulder. Archie looked at her. She looked rattled, like she hadn't expected to hear her sister's name. But she still mouthed, _you're doing fine, Arch._.

Archie's dad, meanwhile, was grimacing. Like he already knew what Archie was going to say.

"I can tell you what all of this is about," Archie said. "And I'd rather talk to you than Sheriff Keller. So I'll be your source, but you have to print it the way I tell you."

-

He was at the Cooper house late. Really late. And both his mom and dad stayed with him, but neither of them looked all that happy about it.

"Not that I'm not proud," said his dad. "The way you're sticking to your guns. I am proud. Or I will be, once I stop feeling like you're putting yourself in danger."

His mom, meanwhile, kept annoying Mrs. Cooper by sticking by Archie's side, and interrupting any time it looked like Betty's mom was trying to put words in Archie's mouth. 

So it was like ten at night when Archie was finally alone with Betty and could ask her the question he'd wanted to. They'd escaped together to the Cooper front steps to collect a Pop's delivery that Betty's dad had ordered.

"You knew him, right, Betty?" Archie asked, before they went back in. "You were friends with Jughead too. You remembered him."

"Of course," Betty said, like that should be obvious. "Didn't you? Isn't that why you spent the weekend with him? To try and fix whatever broke you guys apart?"

Archie looked away. He didn't want to tell Betty that he'd gone and done Chuck's stupid hazing dare. And, more than that, he was ashamed. He'd forgotten Jughead. And, thinking back on it, it seemed like Jughead really hadn't forgotten him.

"Did you ever talk to him after he moved?" he said, instead of answering. "Did he ever ask about me?"

Betty looked like she was choosing her words carefully.

"At first, I'd say hi to him whenever I saw him," she said. "In the supermarket with his mom, or at Pop's. Even if it would make my mom mad. But after a while, Archie, he started just pulling away. I still tried to say hi. But sometimes he'd act like -- I don't know. Like we shouldn't know each other or something."

"But did he ask about me?" Archie demanded.

Betty bit her lip.

"Every time," she said. "Every time, Arch."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: Riverdale High reacts, gifts & humiliation for Jughead.


	8. Chapter 8

The next week was intense.

Tuesday, he and Betty were late to school and hardly awake when they got there. This didn't keep Betty from wanting to talk to Veronica and Cheryl right away. 

She said, "They both deserve to know something's coming that will affect their families, even if we can't tell them the details. Ronnie's my friend. My best friend, even if we fight over you sometimes. And Cheryl -- Cheryl is a human being."

"Okay," Archie said.

He was exhausted. His mind kept circling Jughead. Jughead's jerky movements. The taste of Jughead's mouth. How soft the hair at the nape of his neck was.

"You guys shouldn't fight over me," he told Betty. "There's somebody else."

-

Wednesday, Kevin cornered Archie in the school library. 

"Archie," Kevin said. "What's this I hear about your weekend, buddy? South Side Serpents?"

Kevin had only moved to town in the fifth grade. Kevin wouldn't know Jughead. Archie tried to pick his words carefully.

"One of them is an old friend," he said. "He used to live here. Betty knows him, too."

"Old friend who is into kinky dungeon tools," Kevin said. "Funny kind of friend to have."

Archie had to assume that anything Kevin said would get back to Kevin's dad. So he had to come up with some kind of explanation that wouldn't get Jughead arrested for anything illegal. 

He could only come up with one. It had the benefit of being a mostly-honest one. 

"Um, actually," he said. "It was a sex thing. I went over there to have sex."

-

On Thursday morning, after Cheryl attacked Archie in the lunch room and Veronica flung her pearls at him outside the girls' bathroom, Josie McCoy (who had a personal policy of not ever noticing anything Archie did), said, "Okay, I'll bite. What did Andrews get up to this weekend?"

Kevin appeared. He looked very wise and knowing. 

"Oh, you don't know? Archie has a South Side Serpent sex friend."

"Typical," said Val, who was one of Archie's exes.

-

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, he had to give a statement a bunch of times. His mom paid an old colleague to make sure nobody pressured him, which was good. Sheriff Keller kept trying to ask dangerous-seeming questions about Jughead, and Archie didn't want to get Jughead in any kind of trouble. 

But the Sheriff wasn't the only one there. They'd brought in people from the Federal government. Archie's parents spent the whole weekend on edge, panicky about letting him out of their sight. 

"I'll be glad when this is over," Archie's dad said. 

Archie would too, but not because of the questioning. Because no matter who questioned him, they all seemed to come to the same conclusion. 

"We need to get that other kid in here," said every single interviewer. "He knows more than this one."

But Jughead had gone off the grid completely. He wasn't at the trailer. He wasn't at his school. None of the Serpents were, apparently. They were lying low, just like Jughead had promised. Archie only saw two hauled into the station. First Mustang, cuffed and spitting curses. Then, later, Digger. 

Archie stopped short. 

"That's the wrong guy," he told Sheriff Keller. "I'm pretty sure he's not one of the ones you want."

"Son, why don't you let me do my damn job for once?" Sheriff Keller snapped. 

"Hey, don't talk to him like that," said Archie's dad. 

While they argued, Archie and Digger stood there staring at each other. 

"So when's Jughead going to show up?" Archie asked lamely. 

Digger looked at him like he was stupid. 

"They bring him in, kid, and it'll be in cuffs," was all he said. "Not with his own fancy lawyer and his daddy to look over his shoulder."

Something occurred to Archie. 

"Okay," he told Digger hurriedly. "Okay. Thanks."

He ran down the station hall to where his mother was consulting with their lawyer and a tall blonde woman in a suit. 

"Who's in charge?" he demanded. "Not Sheriff Keller. I mean from the government people."

His mother stared at him.

"Hi, Archie," said the blond woman smoothly. "Special Agent Helfrick. FBI."

Archie took a deep breath. 

"I know what you need to guarantee if you want Jughead to talk to you," he said. 

-

The week after that, he walked Ronnie home and apologized to her. 

"You didn't do anything wrong, Archiekins," she said, giving him a hug. 

Archie knew that. But it didn't make him feel any better. 

"At least you took Cheryl down too," Veronica added, looking like a beautiful contented cat.

-

The week after _that_ , though, Cheryl and Penelope Blossom invited him to their family's maple tapping ceremony. Kevin and Ronnie said it was just to rescue what they could of their family name. That honestly did seem to be why.

But then, before he left, Cheryl pulled him into a hedge and kissed him.

"Oh," Archie said. "Cheryl. I have someone else I--"

"Shhh," she said, putting a finger on his lips. 

Archie let her do this. Cheryl was Cheryl, so this probably wasn't about him. It was almost definitely about Cheryl.

"Because of you," she said, blinking back tears, "Jay-Jay and his babies will someday be able to return to Riverdale."

"It wasn't just me--" Archie began.

Her fingers smacked his lips again.

"Say no more," Cheryl said. "For you, a taste of my ruby red lips. For Betty and the Coopers, a spot on the Vixens, to save her from social oblivion. And for Jughead Jones, the South Side's own Johnny Dangerously? This."

She pressed something into Archie's palm. It nicked him. 

"Ow," Archie said. Then he looked at it. 

"Uh, thank you," he said. "It's a -- it's a really cool pin, Cheryl."

-

After that, he got a letter from Jason and Polly, welcoming him to the Bulldogs and urging him to put himself forward for co-captain.

 _There are some things about the team that need to change,_ Jason wrote. _Just like there are some things about Riverdale that have long needed to change._

Archie showed it to Betty. Betty showed him the letter she'd received, which was pretty much the same, except that it came with an ultrasound picture, and in it Jason had seen fit to spill the details about a Bulldog sex bragging ring that Polly wanted Betty to expose in the Blue & Gold. 

Archie just found himself thinking that Jughead would have a lot to say about that. A lot to say in general, about Bulldog entitlement and bro culture and that kind of thing.

"I miss him," he told Betty.

Betty's face softened. 

"You missed him a lot before, too," she said. 

That was some small satisfaction. He hadn't just let Jughead vanish from his life without complaint. He hadn't been that much of a jerk.

-

Fully a month after Archie's weekend with Jughead, the Register ran the story, FP JONES RELEASED.

In slightly smaller print, under that, it said, INNOCENT OF BLOSSOM AND LODGE'S CRIMES, GANGBANGER MAKES A BARGAIN.

"That was a negotiation," Betty explained. "I wanted them to include _innocent_. But my mom and dad wouldn't put that in unless they could also say _gangbanger_."

Archie thought Jughead would be fine with it, so he was fine with it. He was just glad Agent Helfrick had managed to pull if off. Now, maybe, Jughead could come out of hiding. Blossom and Lodge were behind bars, and Jughead's dad was back in charge of the Serpents, and Jughead -- Jughead was free.

He had the sense that this was what Jughead had wanted. And he hoped that Jughead would want to use his freedom the way Archie wanted him to use it. That Jughead would show up one day at Pop's or something. Would come find Archie. 

He knew where Archie was. He could visit, if he wanted. 

Archie made it about a day thinking like that, getting his hopes up every time he heard the rev of an engine and assumed it was a motorcycle, before he thought, _fuck it_.

He knew where Jughead lived, too. And he wanted to see Jughead. Archie wasn't a twisty kind of thinker. When he wanted something and he knew where it was, he usually just went to get it. Like how he thought he'd wanted a Serpent jacket, so he'd just gone straight to the Serpents. Not his finest moment, sure, but in hindsight also not something he regretted.

-

It was night, but the trailer park was all lit up. Lanterns. Fairy lights. Fire pits in trash cans. More of those than the fairy lights, but still. People were laughing and scuffling and dancing and drinking everywhere, more people than Archie had ever assumed the South Side even contained, and all of them clearly in the mood to celebrate FP's release. Archie was almost run over by a motorcycle three times in the short walk to Jughead's trailer, the drivers shouting curses at him as they sped by.

The South Side in the middle of a party was still the South Side. So in hindsight, maybe Archie shouldn't have worn his Bulldog jacket. But it was an unseasonably freezing October, so he didn't take it off, either. 

Anyway, they hadn't been able to get the paint out. So he kind of fit in.

The party was loudest and most intense right in front of the trailer. FP Jones was there, thinner than he'd been in the album picture, but less drawn than he was in his mugshots. He was wearing only a flannel and a grey henley, despite the cold and snow, and Archie suddenly felt self-conscious because _he'd_ thrown on the henley Jughead had given him before. Which was probably FP's. Which would definitely tell FP -- tell FP something Jughead maybe didn't want him to know.

But FP turned out to be pretty gone. Midway through a burst of laughter with a crowd of Serpents, he slipped on the ice outside the trailer and almost fell over, except that two men scrambled to help him up. He blinked, took a swig from a flask he'd pulled out of his flannel, and looked up in Archie's direction.

"Digger!" he shouted joyfully. "You son of a bitch!" 

Then he was pushing off of his rescuers and walking right past Archie, clapping a newly-arrived Digger on the arm with glee.

Archie stared at them, relieved. Then he shook himself off and started for the trailer, but not before FP Jones said, behind him, "Wait. Red. Wait!"

Archie turned around, unable to beat back panic at the sound of FP's voice. FP walked up to him. Up close, he was a darker, more ravaged Jughead. Handsome, but with a lot of wear and tear.

"You're Fred's son," he said intently.

Archie nodded. FP nodded back, only more slowly, like he was working something out in his head. He looked like he wanted to say something, but didn't. Just brought a fist up to his mouth, like he had some words he wasn't sure he wanted to let out.

The fist turned into a single finger, pointed accusingly at Archie.

"Your old man," FP said, slurring the words a little. "You may not know this, but your old man's owed me for a long time."

Archie swallowed.

"What do you mean?"

FP shook his head. 

"Guess it doesn't matter," he said, after a few excruciatingly long seconds. "Jug -- Jug says you made it square, Red."

He jerked his chin at the trailer.

"He's inside," FP said. "Not much for a party, my kid. Got better stuff to do, I guess."

He sounded both befuddled and proud of that, and with another shake of his head he was walking back to Digger. Archie turned to the trailer, glad to make his escape, and climbed the icy steps. He knocked on the door but no one answered, or maybe he couldn't hear the answer above the noise of the party. He tried the knob. It opened.

Jughead was sitting quietly at the tiny kitchen table, a huge pair of headphones on his ears, a laptop at his fingertips, Hot Dog at his feet. He looked thinner and more peaked than he had a month ago. Archie had the incredible urge to touch him, to move the curl of dark hair out of his eyes. 

"Jughead," he said loudly, trying to be heard over the radiator and the sounds of the party. "Jughead!"

Jughead looked up.

"Archie?" he said.

He sounded shocked that Archie was here. Before, Archie would have assumed that was because Jughead didn't think there was anything serious between them. Now he wondered if maybe Jughead had just expected to be forgotten again.

He felt a painful flash of guilt. He closed the door, trying to drown out the sounds of the party, as Jughead slipped off his headphones.

"Hey," Archie told him. "Your dad looks happy."

"Well, he's been getting three square meals a day for the past few months," Jughead said, with a wry raise of his eyebrows. "This is probably the healthiest he's been in a while, and he's not even in a cell."

The words were cold, but the tone wasn't. Jughead was happy to have FP back. Archie could tell. 

"I'm sorry I told about everything," he said to Jughead.

Jughead offered up his _Archie, please_ look.

"No, you're not."

"Alright!" Archie admitted. "I'm not. You were in serious trouble, Jughead. You needed help. And you gave me all that stuff, and what was I supposed to do with it? I didn't even mean for the Coopers to get their hands on it, but I'm not sorry they did--"

Jughead had stood up and moved away from the table by now, and now he cut Archie off.

"You revealed the secrets of the Serpents," he told Archie, in a dangerously smooth voice. "Put the FBI on my trail, made my dad their number one informant for the Blossom and Lodge trials."

Archie's heart sank.

"I know," he said. "but you -- you were just missing! I had no idea where you were or if you were okay, and--"

"Archie?" Jughead said carefully.

"Yes?"

"You were brilliant."

Then his hands were closing on Archie's jaw and his mouth was on Archie's mouth. Every single part of Archie felt lit up inside, bright as the trailer park was tonight. Jughead tugged Archie to the living room easy chair and Archie followed gladly, not even caring when Jughead stopped kissing him long enough to shove him. Archie fell back and landed in the chair, confused and thrilled. 

There would be more sexy straddling, probably. Good. He liked the sexy straddling. 

But before Jughead could climb on top of him, the door to the trailer banged open. Both Archie and Jughead jumped. 

It was Jughead's dad. He lurched in, craning his neck to look first in the kitchen before locating them by the easy chair. He threw something at Archie. Reflexively, Archie caught it.

"Didn't get you a birthday present," he muttered. "That'll do."

"That?" Jughead said. 

Archie stared down at the box in his hands. 

Triple-tested Trojan Quality 36 ct. value pack. Lubricated. Large.

"I'm your father, Jughead," FP said now, leaning stubbornly against the trailer wall. "I want you to be safe. Never got the chance to give you the talk before I went in, about the birds and the bees and not accidentally making babies--"

"Archie's a _boy_."

FP looked a lot less fazed by this than Archie had assumed he might be. He grinned. Like with Jughead, his grin was all in the eyebrows. 

"Yeah, well, make him a damn man. Turn up the heat!"

Then he strolled out, leaving a horrified Jughead in his wake.

"That was," Archie began.

"Don't say it. Inappropriate. You don't have to say it."

"I was going to say nice of him," Archie suggested.

Jughead gave a dramatic full-body shudder. 

"We are going to put the last two minutes out of our minds immediately, right now, forever," he informed Archie, and started unbuttoning his shirt. Archie would have done the same except that his words brought up something Archie had wanted to talk about.

"Juggie," he said, feeling miserable about even having to say this. "I wanted to tell you something. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I forgot you, dude."

Jughead stopped undressing.

"Betty told you?" he asked carefully.

"I saw pictures," Archie said. "Me and you. And our families. My parents said I had some kind of accident that messed up my memory. If I'd _known_ , dude--"

Jughead laughed, but there was no humor in it. 

"How could you know, Arch?" he said. "I was too stubborn to tell you."

Then he was straddling Archie. It was more intimate in the easy chair somehow, the cramped nature of it locking them closer together. Jughead kissed him breathless as his hands undid Archie's fly, and then they had to disentangle themselves to get their jeans off, get properly naked.

Hot Dog whined at them. 

Jughead looked up, annoyed. 

"Let's go to the bedroom," Archie suggested. Now that he thought about it, it made no sense to have sex in the living room. Anyone could barge in, and anyway Jughead's couch and most of the furniture was missing. Archie guessed it had been destroyed when Blossom and Lodge had broken into the trailer. 

Jughead said, low, "We can't go into the bedroom."

Archie stared at him. Jughead sighed. He pulled his jeans back up, which was definitely the opposite of what Archie wanted to happen, and said, "Did you notice Helfrick?"

"What?" Archie said. 

"Helfrick," Jughead said simply. He beckoned Archie to the window. After pulling his own jeans on, Archie went. He could see FP and his buddies laughing by a fire pit, and Jughead was right. Helfrick was there, looking pretty businesslike despite the happy chaos. The two men who'd helped FP up earlier looked pretty businesslike too, and now that Archie got a good look at them he could see they weren't wearing Serpent jackets. Just a lot of black and some pretty visible gun holsters. 

"The bedroom's full of boxes," Jughead said. "It's not a welcome back party, Archie. It's a going away party."

"What?" Archie said. He felt like all his thoughts were jumping off a cliff, and at the bottom of the cliff there was just a big lake of panic. 

"We have to leave the South Side," Jughead said. "My dad and I are key witnesses in the two biggest trials Riverdale's ever seen."

"Where are you going?" Archie demanded. 

"I can't say that yet," Jughead said, looking cagey. "They told me to keep it quiet--"

"And you were going to just have sex with me and not tell me?" Archie said. He was shouting and he didn't care. He still felt guilty about forgetting Jughead, but that guilt came with a side helping of frustration. Jughead could have _told_ him. Jughead could have been honest. But every time it seemed like there was something Archie should know about him, Jughead just circled it warily instead of confronting it. 

"It won't be that bad--" Jughead began now. 

Archie stared pulling on his shirt. 

"You're leaving," he said bluntly. "You're going into witness protection or something--"

"Just trust me," Jughead said, looking a little spooked. 

"I did!" Archie pointed out. "I trusted you and put my neck out for you. I got your side of the story published, and you can't even tell me the truth, Jughead!"

The frustration had just turned into panicky, stupid anger. Archie felt like he couldn't turn it off. He grabbed his Bulldog jacket and wrenched open the door. 

"Thanks for that," he said, and left Jughead staring after him helplessly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next installment: a quick resolution, lunch, less danger than before.


	9. Chapter 9

At least Bulldog season was in high gear now. That would give Archie plenty of ways to get out his anger over Jughead leaving. He needed to get it out, otherwise his brain would just go around and around in an anxious loop-the-loop. Jughead was leaving. Like the last time Jughead had gone, like how Grundy had gone, like how his mom would be leaving soon. 

"Did you know this would happen?" he asked her, helping her pack before he went to school the next morning. 

"Archie, Jughead and his dad would probably be facing charges themselves if they weren't agreeing to do this," his mother said. "This is the best possible result for them."

But the best result for Jughead wasn't a great result for Archie. Archie skipped his usual walk to school with Betty to sprint there instead, hoping the exercise would chase away some of his hopeless anger. It worked for maybe five minutes. But then he was walking past the school office and hallucinating Jughead anyway, dreaming him up right there. 

"Archie," Jughead said. 

Archie shook his head, willing him away. This was the crappy thing about having such intense feelings for Jughead. It made every part of Archie's head rebellious. 

" _Archie_ ," Jughead said again. 

Archie stared at him. He was in a worn black jacket with a corduroy collar, less bulky than his Serpent leather, and it made him look even thinner than before. Oddly fragile. For a second, Archie still assumed he was some kind of hallucination, because this couldn't have been the teen gang leader that had humiliated him and handcuffed him and willfully brought him to orgasm like seven times in three days.

Then his hand closed on Archie's wrist. Warm. Actually here. 

"You're not gone," Archie said stupidly.

Jughead looked at him like he thought Archie was the dumbest person in the world.

"That's why I told you to just hold on and trust me," he said testily.

"You said you were leaving Riverdale--"

"I said I was leaving the South Side," Jughead corrected. "My dad and I are number one and number two, respectively, on Blossom and Lodge's shit lists. We can't live in a trailer that any goon with rudimentary lockpicking skills can break into. Serpents or not, we'd be dead in like two days."

He had a point. Behind him, Archie caught sight of two men in the office. FP and one of the agents from before. 

"What do you mean, where are his immunization records?" FP was demanding.

"I mean the records of his immunization," said the school secretary, in a bored voice.

"Well, how should I know? I was in jail. It's not like I could take him to the doctor."

Jughead's face took on a pained expression.

"It might take a little while to get me registered," he told Archie.

Wait.

"You're transferring here?" Archie said. "You're moving back to the North Side?"

Every piece of anger, hopelessness, and frustration he'd been feeling over the past few weeks -- no, over the past few months -- transformed into delight. Jughead wasn't leaving. Jughead was coming back. To _Archie_. 

Jughead, though, didn't look delighted. For a second he looked nervous, and then with a jerk of his eyebrows he made himself completely blank instead.

"It's hardly my choice," he said, back to his audiobook voice. "Coming back to the peppiest neighborhood this side of Sweetwater River, where my gang connections and my juvenile conviction precede me--"

Archie didn't care about that.

"Be my boyfriend," he said. He said it fast, forcing it out, so that he wouldn't chicken out of saying it. That was what he wanted. Jughead and him. Together.

Jughead stared at him.

"Archie, I may have been top of the food pyramid at South Side High and in the Serpents, but here I fully expect to be the human equivalent of a kale smoothie when what you want is a milkshake from Pop's. An inedible, undateable persona non grata," he said, saying the words very clear and slow like he thought that would help Archie understand them. 

"I don't speak Spanish," Archie told Jughead, shaking his head. "But if you mean that you don't think you're gonna be popular, then I don't care, dude. Betty just published a take-down of the Bulldogs. She's like the opposite of popular right now, and I still sit with her at lunch and stuff. And that's what I want to do with you."

Jughead was still staring, like he had no idea what to do with Archie.

"Also," Archie added, "I want to do other stuff with you. Like hang out with your friends and make you hang out with mine, and hear you use that audiobook voice you have. And ride your motorbike and sing to you. And sex."

In case Jughead wasn't getting that. 

"Audiobook voice?" he said, squinting in confusion. "Archie, I was a Serpent. And a juvenile offender. On those two points alone, I'm too criminally weird for you--"

Archie said, doggedly, "I don't think so--"

"Juggie!" came Betty's voice from down the hall. "Jughead!"

Jughead looked up, his expression hunted. Betty and Kevin descended on them. 

"You must be Archie's sex friend, Jughead Jones," Kevin said. "Kevin Keller, your student tour guide."

"Oh, good. The sheriff's son is my tour guide," Jughead said. "Guess I know how Weatherbee wants to welcome me."

He gave Betty an awkward side-hug. Archie said, "Boyfriend. Not sex friend."

"What?" said Kevin. "Really?"

"No," Jughead said quickly.

"Dude," Archie said. "You kidnapped me. If you can kidnap me, you can date me."

"What?" said Betty and Kevin together. Betty said it like she was concerned. Kevin said it like all the holidays had come at once.

"Archie," Jughead said, in a long-suffering tone.

Archie's mom had explained to him that Sheriff Keller couldn't do anything about the kidnapping if Archie chose not to press charges. And Archie wasn't pressing charges, unless the charges were something like, 'please get naked with me again,' or 'come over to my house and play x-box and let me make you that mac and cheese you like.'

"Why won't you date me?" he demanded now.

"I _kidnapped_ you," Jughead said. 

"I don't have a problem with that," Archie pointed out. "My problem is you let me go, and now you won't take me back."

-

Despite whatever issues there were with the immunization records, Jughead was registered by lunch. Archie found him sitting alone in the lunch room, hunched over a tray that had nearly every conceivable lunch, soup, and dessert bar offering Riverdale High had to offer. He was looking at it all with a gleam in his eye. Archie slid into place across from him.

"Hi," he said. He felt nervous for some reason. He and Jughead had eaten lunch together before, but not at a table, like a date or something. 

"Pizza bagels, Archie," Jughead said, talking with his mouth full.

"Uh, yeah?" Archie said.

Jughead chewed and swallowed.

"If you ever wanted solid proof of Riverdale's class-based inequity," he said, "Look no further than the fact that at South Side High we're lucky to get un-expired milk, while you guys have a special lunch station devoted entirely to pizza bagels."

"Okay, but not an Olympic swimming pool," Archie said. 

They had to be fair to the North Side here.

Jughead made an affronted face and opened his mouth to say something. As he did, two pairs of heels clattered across the lunch room floor and then two girls were forcing their way onto his side of the table. Ronnie and Cheryl. One on either side of Jughead. Archie leaned back, disappointed that it wasn't just him and Jughead anymore. 

Jughead looked first at Ronnie, then at Cheryl. For the second time today, he looked like a small animal cornered by Vegas in the yard.

"Jughead," Cheryl began magnanimously.

"Jones the third," Ronnie finished. She one-upped Cheryl by extending a manicured hand. Jughead didn't take it, instead preferring to shovel more food into his mouth.

Veronica wasn't fazed.

"You know, you and I have something in common," she began.

"Prison dads?" Jughead offered, through a mouthful of pizza bagel.

"I was going to say that we're neighbors and we've both dated Archie Andrews," she said smoothly.

"No--" Jughead began. Cheryl cut him off. 

" _I_ , on the other hand, was not going to falsely presume that you and I have common ground when there so clearly is none," she said. "I just wanted to know if you got my present."

She looked pointedly at Archie. Archie said, "Oh, sorry, Cheryl. It's at my house."

Jughead looked alarmed, like he thought it was a bomb or something.

"No," Archie reassured him. "It's cool. Cheryl's on Jason's side so she likes you."

"I wouldn't go that far," Cheryl said. "But it's true that any friend of Jay-Jay's can expect to start out on my good side. And mother and I want nothing to do with father. We've already encouraged him to take imprisonment as a cue to kill himself."

Everyone stared at her, except for Archie, who took this as his cue to mouth, _See? We have weirder people than you._

"I have not encouraged my father to kill himself," Ronnie said after a few minutes. She said it politely and regally, because she was Veronica Lodge. Then she continued.

"But I want you to know that I don't approve of my father's actions, and I see what's happened as an incentive to turn over a new leaf."

Cheryl sniffed, like this wasn't as good as her reaction. Jughead continued to look hunted.

"Cheryl's serious. She gave you this, uh, really cool pin," Archie said. "And Ronnie's serious too. She helped Betty expose the playbook."

Jughead stared at him like he had no idea what Archie was talking about. As he did, Betty and Kevin squeezed in on either side of Archie.

"So, Jughead," Kevin said, "Given in to Archie's ginger charms yet?"

Veronica shook her head. "We've all been down that road."

"Are all of your friends going to sit here?" Jughead demanded of Archie. "With me? Should I move and let you all get on with your Riverdale High peppy friend group thing?"

"Of course not," Betty said, astonished.

"If you move, we'll just follow you," Cheryl said. "Like the whispers. Like the gossip. Make no mistake, Jughead Jones. We're united in infamy. On the one hand, all of you, a grab-bag of bargain basement teen stereotypes. On the other, myself, a tender rosebud growing from poisonous roots."

Everyone was quiet for a second, unsure of how to respond. 

"I went on a date with Cheryl once," Archie said. "It was honestly a lot more strange than anything you and I did together."

Cheryl had to be on Archie's side or something, because she didn't disagree. 

-

Skipping Bulldog practice was a big no-no, but it wasn't like Archie was captain. He was in the doghouse with Coach Clayton, who didn't approve of people who let their jackets get tagged by gangs. So he didn't think he'd be any worse off, really, if today he chose to cut out of school at the same time Jughead did, running to catch up with him. Jughead had his headphones on again and this time he didn't take them off. Just scowled. 

"Are you actually neighbors with Ronnie?" Archie said. 

Jughead waved vaguely at the headphones. 

Archie stared at him. If Jughead was serious about not talking to him, then he was feeling, to go by the word of the day calendar, _bereft_. He hoped he looked as bereft as he felt. 

Sighing, Jughead removed the headphones. 

"I don't know why I'm fighting this," he muttered. "Besides the obvious excuses of trauma, low self esteem, and undiagnosed depression."

"I have dyslexia," Archie told him, not wanting him to feel bad about any of that. 

Oddly, Jughead laughed. 

"I know," he said. "Archie, I know way more about you than you know about me. If Betty was tutoring you at the library, I always made sure to ask her why. If I saw you at Pop's, I always made a note of who you were with. How do you think I knew about what Ms. Grundy was doing? Because I saw you going down to Sweetwater River, and I couldn't stop myself from following."

He looked sad, like he thought Archie would think he was a creep or something. Maybe once Archie might have. But he'd spent a weekend in Jughead's life, seen how brittle and lonely Jughead was. Archie had been given the chance to forget their friendship, the chance to move on. But Jughead had lived with it always, lived with the thought that in another world his life might be different, might be stable, might have had more in it than midnight drug deals and an empty trailer. 

"You can follow me anywhere you want," Archie told him slowly now. "Or I'll follow you."

Jughead stopped walking and just stared at him. Then, without warning, his hands were fisted in Archie's jacket and he was kissing Archie. 

Archie kissed back. It felt like it had been ages since he'd done this. Before Jughead, he'd never had any problems moving on, finding someone new to kiss. But after Labor Day weekend he hadn't wanted someone new. He'd just wanted Jughead. 

When they broke apart, Jughead rested his forehead on Archie's. His eyelashes were a little wet. Archie wanted to kiss those, too. 

"There's a special agent watching us make out right now," Jughead informed him. 

"Seriously?" Archie said. 

Jughead nodded slowly. 

"Want to see where I live? It's not far."

He led Archie down Riverdale's main drag, under the sweep of sugar maples that lined the streets of the North Side. Archie liked how Jughead fit there. It was like, without Jughead, all this would be commonplace, just any other small town. But putting Jughead into it, all fine bones and jerky movements, made the view seem interesting.

They stopped in front of a fancy old apartment building. The Pembrooke. A special agent let them in.

"A special agent is your doorman?" Archie said, awestruck.

"The old one was a Lodge informant," Jughead said. "The penthouse here belongs to Hermione Lodge."

"What?" Archie said, as Jughead bypassed the stately elevators and led him up a wide marble staircase.

"Hiram's the one they really want," Jughead said. "Not Clifford. Apparently Hiram's company has been cooking books for Cliffords all over the country. Helfrick's known about it for a while. She tried to get him on a financial scheme a few years ago and couldn't, because one of his many drug connections killed their informant. Blew up a building to do it. So this time they decided the informants will live in the same building as his family. Go to the same school as his daughter."

Archie's mouth went dry.

"You're in that kind of danger?"

"I've been in danger ever since I put myself in Clifford's sights," Jughead said simply. "At least this time my dad and I have some protection. Anyway, Helfrick isn't interested in putting Lodge away. She wants _him_ to rat. And in the meantime she's going to make sure everyone in town knows that if the Joneses are harmed, it was probably him. So we're safer from him than we've ever been."

He turned on one of the landings and stopped in front of a fancy-looking apartment door. Looked at Archie over his shoulder.

"My dad's out," he said.

"Oh?" Archie said. He felt nervous again for some reason. But it was an excited nervous, like when Jughead had loomed over him all those weeks ago and just cut his shirt off. Sort of a helpless feeling, but one Archie was into.

"Get in here, Archie," Jughead said softly. "I know just what I want to do with you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last installment: sex and friendship!


	10. Chapter 10

Jughead was surprisingly strong.

Archie was more built, but Jughead could still shove him onto the mattress. Archie stared up at him, delighted. Then Jughead climbed on top of him and pushed Archie's shirt up. He brought his mouth to Archie's chest and sucked a hot, wet trail to Archie's nipples. Archie put a hand on Jughead's beanie, overwhelmed, before remembering that that was off limits.

But when he put his hand back down, Jughead grabbed it and guided it back. Didn't stop what he was doing, didn't stop kissing and touching Archie. But he used Archie's hand to gently nudge the beanie off.

It was the last thing Archie expected. And it was the best thing. Because he got the sense that hardly anybody got to see Jughead like this. Only Archie. Only Archie got to run his fingers through his thick, dark hair. Jughead shuddered a few times as he did it.

"I want you to suck my dick," Jughead murmured.

Good. Archie wanted to suck his dick. Archie had spent a month thinking of his taste, the feel of his skin. Archie had stayed up nights remembering what it was like to fuck into him, wondering if Jughead would ever want to show him what it felt like to get fucked. 

Oh, and one other thing. 

"Can you--" Archie began. "Uh. Do that thing. Where you're on top of me, and like, you're using your book voice. And you're, you know. Calling me your dog and stuff?"

He'd missed that. 

"Archie," Jughead said, sounding strangled. "You weren't supposed to like that. That was to show you how bad I was."

"Um," Archie said. 

He didn't mean for the um to come out like he was embarrassed for Jughead. He didn't want to be embarrassed for Jughead. But it had only taken like two days to realize that Jughead wasn't good at being bad-bad. He was only sexy-bad. 

"Okay, I-- sure," Jughead said. "I'll dominate you. That's what you want?"

"With the book voice," Archie insisted. 

"I don't know what the book voice _is_."

"It's that thing you do? Where it's like you decided to ignore me and just read yourself a book you made up."

Actually, it was kind of rude. But Archie still liked it. 

Jughead glared at him, but didn't say he wouldn't do the voice. Instead he climbed off and started stripping off his jacket and shirt. He tossed it all at a ratty backpack that was just sitting there looking small in the huge Pembrooke bedroom, which otherwise just had a mattress and the easy chair. 

"Oh, I wanna do it in the chair," Archie breathed out. 

They'd been interrupted the last time they'd tried to do it in the chair. He was kind of sad about that.

But Jughead just said, "Who's dominating who again? Clothes off, Archie. Don't just stand there." 

Grinning, Archie did as ordered. 

Jughead took the chair. 

"Take off my jeans," he told Archie, sounding bored. It wasn't quite his book voice, but it was close. Archie kneeled in front of him and helped him finish undressing, feeling the warmth of his body as he pushed his pants down around his ankles. Jughead's dick was already tenting in his boxers. Archie palmed it, unable to stop himself.

"You are my boyfriend now, right?" he asked Jughead.

"Are you going to _not_ sleep with me if I say no?" Jughead asked, raising an eyebrow.

Archie didn't bother to try and figure out the double-negatives. He just said, simply, "I want to be yours."

Before, he would have been happy to be anybody's. Betty's. Ronnie's. Grundy's. Wanted to fit with someone, it didn't really matter who. Only now it did. Now he wanted to be Jughead's, only Jughead's.

"If that's what you want," Jughead said softly. 

He leaned forward and cupped Archie's jaw, then kissed him. Archie kissed back, eager, and then Jughead was pulling down his boxers and guiding Archie's hands to his leaking dick. Archie closed his hands on the base, liking how hot and hard it was. Then he licked up his length, still letting Jughead guide him. He lapped at the head of Jughead's cock before closing his mouth over it and sucking, loving the groan Jughead gave in response. 

One of his hands was firm and comforting on Archie's head. The other was fumbling with something, handing it to Archie.

Lube. Jughead scooted his ass to the edge of the chair, making Archie choke a little when his dick was pushed deeper. He rubbed Archie's head comfortingly, as if to apologize.

"Can you--" he started. "Your fingers--"

Archie had often been accused of being slow, but this time he got the picture. He dribbled some lube on his fingers and pressed one to Jughead's hole. Briefly, Archie wondered what it would be like to taste the rim, if Jughead would ever let him do anything that weird. But Jughead wanted his mouth occupied elsewhere. So he pressed one finger in instead, slowly, looking for that spot that had made Jughead go wild before. With his other hand he cupped Jughead's ass, steadying him. 

Archie was painfully hard now. They both were. But after one finger, then another, Jughead was the one falling apart and moaning. Fucking back against Archie's hand. Archie had to be careful when he rubbed that little nub inside him, because it made Jughead jerk his hips, buried his dick deeper in Archie's mouth. But he liked how, even though Jughead was the one giving the orders, he was the one who got to undo Jughead. He worked that spot inside Jughead and every single time he got it, Jughead reacted like he'd just gotten the best shock of his life. His hands tangled up Archie's hair, his legs hooked around Archie's shoulders and drew Archie in. Archie hummed around his cock. Jughead gasped out, "Good, Archie. _Good_."

He came pretty soon. Archie hadn't had all that many opportunities to make him come, considering, but he definitely hadn't forgotten what worked on Jughead. After he'd swallowed, he pulled back and started jerking himself. It only took a few strokes for him to come too.

"There goes the carpet," Jughead said. He was looking down at Archie, and at first Archie couldn't place his expression. The way his lashes fluttered a little, the little smile. It was so _content_ , and that was something he'd never seen on Jughead before. He wanted Jughead to look like that more often, though. 

"Are we done with the chair?" Jughead said, after a few happy seconds. "Or should I return the favor before we move to the bed?"

"The bed?" Archie said, excited.

"You did just prep me."

His excitement didn't waver, but there was a small dash of disappointment.

"So you, uh--" Archie said. "I mean last time you wanted to catch too--"

"Catch?" Jughead said, raising his eyebrows. "We don't need euphemisms, Archie. I wanted you to fuck me."

And, to be fair, fucking him had been awesome. So awesome that Archie's dick was already firming up again at the thought.

"Do you want to know why?" Jughead continued, like this wasn't maybe the most important question on Archie's mind right now. Archie nodded. Jughead let his hands fiddle with the frayed upholstery of the easy chair for a few seconds before he answered.

"I had no expectation I would ever see you again--" he said.

That wasn't true. Archie would have come back. Archie had come back.

"I wanted to find you right away," he pointed out. "But you were gone--"

Jughead waved him quiet.

"You and I weren't supposed to know each other, Archie," he said. "You were on the North Side. I was on the South Side. You had this amazing, loving home. I didn't have that. I joined the Serpents. You joined the Bulldogs. Ever since we stopped being friends, the gap between us just grew and grew. Do you know what it's like to watch somebody and feel yourself getting further and further away? Knowing you're on different planets."

He paused for a second. Looked oddly vulnerable. 

"I knew I would have to give you back," he said finally. "So I wanted to feel you, after. I wanted to have that ache for hours, days even. So that I'd _know_ that weekend was real and not some fantasy I'd made up."

Something about that hurt. The idea that Jughead had really, honestly thought Archie wouldn't want him after that weekend. Had assumed Archie wouldn't still be his. 

"It was real," he said. "Jug, this is real. Being with you is the realest I've felt in a really long time. And I want that -- that ache. I want it too."

Because now he really was totally hard, and it wasn't just because Jughead had been using his book voice to explain. It was the thought of Jughead feeling him for days after, of Jughead just walking around like that. Jughead hadn't even cleaned himself out after they'd had sex. The whole time they'd been in Pop's, the whole time he'd dismissed Archie after, he'd been wet and well-fucked because of _Archie_. 

That was very strange and very hot and more than a little heartbreaking. A combination that, really, was Jughead's whole thing.

"I want you to fuck me," Archie told him now. "Okay? I want to feel you afterwards too."

Jughead nodded, once, very seriously. Then he hauled himself over the side of the chair and went to his tattered backpack, rooting around for something. He pulled it out. The box of condoms. 

"Do we have to--"

"Yes," Jughead said, leaving no room for argument. "I honestly, seriously, cannot handle another conversation with my father about this, so yes."

Archie figured that was fair. Plus, safe. 

"Get on the bed," Jughead said. He tossed the lube at Archie, so once Archie was on the bed he got some of that on his hands, figuring Jughead wanted him to prep himself.

"Wait," Jughead said. "Turn around. Hands and knees."

Archie felt some trepidation, but did that. He felt really exposed like this. More exposed even than when Jughead had had him handcuffed, because now he couldn't see Jughead. And that wasn't a win. Jughead was nice to look at.

He felt the mattress dip when Jughead climbed on the bed. Then, without warning, he felt Jughead's finger circling his hole. He was already keyed up, so it felt oddly good. 

"I'm going to figure out how to lick you back here," Jughead told him, in the matter of fact voice of someone who knew he was weird and was at least a little bit fine with it. "In a not-gross way. Less gross way. And once I figure it out, I'm going to do it."

"Oh my god," Archie said. "Oh my _god_ , I was just thinking about that."

"Horn dog," Jughead said mildly. 

Then he was reaching for the lube himself. A second later he was back to rubbing the rim of Archie's hole, working those nerve endings. Archie hugged his pillow and let him do it, starting to understand why this drove Jughead wild. Everything back there was more sensitive than he realized. When Jughead slipped a finger in, the combination of raw sensation and intrusion made Archie's dick leak furiously. He could hear himself moaning and didn't care. Jughead shushed him.

"I'm going to hurt you if I just push in," he said. "Let's work up to three. You can hold off for three fingers, right, Archie? A big, popular, Riverdale High football player like you."

Archie knew he was being mocked a little and didn't care. He was too full with one finger, and then with two, the stretch almost painful. But it was a fullness that set his nerves on fire. It did something to him, made him want to fuck back and ask for more. When Jughead did finally get three fingers in, the burn warred with the pleasure of Jughead finally scraping him in just the right spot. Archie almost came then, when Jughead hit that nub wired to go right to his dick. He understood now why this had taken Jughead -- smart, sarcastic, cagey _Jughead_ \-- and left him a groaning mess. Archie was hardly any better. 

"Shh," Jughead said, patting his back with his free hand. "It's okay, Archie."

But it wasn't remotely okay, because he was going to come harder than he ever had before and he hadn't even had Jughead's dick yet. He was on the edge of release when Jughead finally pulled his fingers out and Archie heard him wrestling with the condom packaging. 

"Archie," Jughead said, after a few seconds. 

Archie could barely form words at this point. He gave what he hoped was an enthusiastic sound that would keep Jughead eager to fuck him. 

"Sit up," Jughead instructed. 

"Dude, no," Archie managed. "Just fuck me already!"

"Alright, maybe here on the North Side you can make all the demands you want. Maybe it comes with the homecoming dances and the gentle smiles from cheerleaders and the parental affection. But on the South Side nothing gets you nothing."

That was so unfair. He was using the audiobook voice. That was _so_ unfair. Archie sat up. He was careful not to brush his dick on the bedsheets or anything. He was so hard now he thought the slightest touch would be enough. 

But Jughead didn't touch him. Instead he handed Archie the condom and leaned back on his elbows, legs spread just enough so that his dick was totally exposed. 

"Put it on," he told Archie. He was making Archie help with his own -- his own deflowering. And sounding so careless about it, like it didn't matter at all. Like there were still Serpents watching and he was still the leader and Archie was still just his prisoner. 

Archie wanted Jughead to fuck him _so_ bad now. He did as ordered and rolled the condom into Jughead's dick, then lubed it up. 

"Now you," Jughead instructed. 

Archie stared at him. Jughead stared coolly back. He jerked his chin at his dick, standing at full mast, waiting for Archie's attention. 

"Fuck yourself on it," Jughead said. "Or are all those jock lunges and squats and barbell lifts useless for this kind of thing?"

He was looking at Archie's body pretty openly as he said that, which really ruined his attempts to sound like he was above it all. That was the thing about Jughead -- even as a Serpent, even while menacing Archie's shirts with his pocket knife, he'd never actually pulled off being above it all. That was too North Side. That was Chuck and the Bulldogs. Jughead wasn't like that. He was too hungry for people to know him, and too genuinely surprised when people did. 

So when Archie straddled him and lined up the head of Jughead's dick with his hole, the best thing -- the _best_ thing -- was the flash of shocked joy he caught for a second on Jughead's face. 

"You've gotta learn that I do like you, man," Archie said gently. 

Jughead blinked and then stared at him, a little bit astonished. 

So Archie enjoyed that too, for a second. Just a second. The next second he was clumsily lowering himself on Jughead's dick, feeling it breach him, and all the words were knocked right out of him. Everything narrowed to the feeling of fucking himself on Jughead's cock. 

It felt too big. Too painful. He must have shown it on his face because Jughead's hands were on his hips in seconds, rubbing circles. 

"Slow, Arch," he said. "We-- we don't have to--"

But he _wanted_ to. So he kept going. It took longer to adjust to the fullness than he wanted, but he did adjust. He held onto Jughead's shoulders and lowered himself until he bottomed out. It felt a little triumphant, like he'd done something right for once. He clumsily lifted himself off a little and tried it again, smoother this time. Jughead kept whispering things to him, encouraging things, so that made it easier. Every time he lifted himself off and re-breached, it got a little easier. Less burn, more pleasure. He'd put enough lube on that soon it was a slick rub on all his nerve endings. It felt good even before he managed the angle that hit his sweet spot, that left him moaning, seeing stars.

By then Jughead's hands were firm on his hips, helping him, guiding him. He was whispering good things, too, nice things, about Archie being the best thing in his life, Archie being maybe the best thing in this _town_. Archie could only sob back. The pleasure and fullness was too much. He couldn't hold this other stuff in his brain, this story Jughead had built up for years about him. They'd talk about that after.

He ended up riding Jughead until he had what was definitely the best orgasm of his life so far. Jughead jerked him off as he came on both their stomachs, like he didn't care about the mess, and then let Archie lie back so he could fuck into him a few more times. When he came himself, it was a lot more quietly than before. As soon as he slipped out, his hands were curling around Archie's shoulders and he was tucking his face into the curve of Archie's neck. Archie let him. He ran his hands through Jughead's hair, finally, finally allowed to touch it like this.

"Hey," he said, after a few minutes.

"Hey yourself," Jughead said.

"I'm not _that_ good."

"Okay. I shouldn't have congratulated you on your sexual prowess anyway. Please keep what we just did out of whatever that playbook is," Jughead said.

Archie cuffed him on the shoulder.

"Dude! Not what I meant. I just meant that whatever you've made up about me, Jughead. About me being all good on the North Side while you were bad on the South Side. It's stupid. I don't think I was ever all that good. I was just normal. I didn't even _do_ anything good for anybody until I met you again. So whatever story you have in your head--"

"Oh, it's on paper," Jughead muttered. "The chronicle of Riverdale's all-American boy next door--"

"Seriously?"

"Hey, you have music. I have writing."

"Don't put that crap you made up about me in a book, Jughead," Archie said warningly.

"Tell you what," Jughead said. "You never have to read the book. So you never have to deal with what I like about you. And in exchange, I never have to listen to you singing about fate and kidnapping ever again."

Archie opened his mouth to protest. Jughead lifted his head and gave him a sloppy kiss on the mouth before he could. 

So that distracted him, because Jughead was a pretty amazing kisser. And anyway it was Jughead's loss, because Archie was going to write songs about him that were way, way more embarrassing than whatever Jughead put in his book. About his eyelashes, his beauty marks, his fondness for dogs, his kisses. 

Honestly, Jughead was going to have, like, zero reputation for badassery by the time Archie was through with him. 

-

Later, after a very battered watch in Jughead's backpack started ringing at them, after they got their clothes on and stumbled into the hall only to find a special agent carefully avoiding their eyes, Archie and Jughead walked to Pop's.

Archie made Jughead hold his hand.

"You're my boyfriend now," he pointed out.

"Are you trying to make me regret it?" Jughead said. 

But he had that small smile on his face again. And he didn't pull away, even though he was wearing his Serpent jacket now. The jacket wasn't Riverdale High-appropriate, he'd told Archie, but that didn't make him any less a Serpent.

The others were waiting for them at Pop's. Ricky, Joaquin, Diana, Spits. Most of them looked pretty hung-over, probably from FP's party. Joaquin looked maybe a little knowing once he got sight of Archie and Jughead's joined hands.

"I _knew_ you were on my side," Archie said.

So then Joaquin looked panicky and offended. 

Ricky said, dismissive, "He never has been on your side." 

But he got up anyway and squeezed into the girls' side of the booth, giving Archie and Jughead enough space to sit together. As he did, a shaggy white nose poked its way out from under the table, desperate for Jughead's affections. Jughead patted it and made shushing noises as he slid into Joaquin's side of the booth. 

"Is that--"

"Shhh," said the Serpents. Who were, after all, a gang, and probably didn't care about health code violations. 

So Archie shhh-shhed. He was rewarded with Hot Dog's nose in his lap as soon as he sat down. 

"He likes my dog a lot," he told Ricky, in case Ricky hadn't gotten all the hints. 

"Some people have got no taste in dogs," Ricky said pointedly. Jughead scowled. 

Diana said, "You get to play on those fancy Riverdale High tennis courts yet, Jug?"

"Oh, sure," Jughead said, as the waitress came and slid him a cup of coffee. 

"We haven't got tennis courts--" Archie began. 

"How about that movie theater they got?" said Ricky. 

"Surround sound," Jughead said. "3D. Puts the Twilight to shame."

"We don't have--"

"And pony stables they've all got for their ponies?" said Joaquin. 

"We don't--"

"Plus their in-school planetarium," said Diana.

"Okay," Archie said. "You know what? I think you're all making fun of me."

The Serpents broke out into guffaws. 

"Noooo," Jughead said, but he was smiling. 

"We don't have any of that, or a swimming pool. All we have is a nice lounge and some pizza bagels," Archie informed the Serpents. 

There was a second of silence as the waitress brought Jughead his fries. 

Then, outraged, Spits said, "You get _pizza bagels_?"

Archie hardly heard the trill of the Pop's bell over the insulted uproar that followed, in which even Hot Dog abandoned Archie's lap for Jughead's, probably in protest or something. 

"See, you're all so _spoiled_ \--" Spits was saying. 

"Why would you mention the pizza bagels?" Jughead was muttering. "Why?"

"I should do a damn initiation where I go grab a damn Bulldog jacket," Diana said. "You get pizza bagels. We get your jackets."

"I hate those preppy--" said Joaquin. 

Then stopped. Looked sideways, at someone standing right by Archie's shoulder. 

"Hi," said Kevin Keller. 

It came out long and nervous. More of a _hiiiiiiiii_. A hi about to change its mind and turn around and leave. Behind Kevin, Cheryl rolled her eyes and Veronica looked like she was smelling something unpleasant. Next to Kevin, Betty smiled the way she did whenever her mother said something suddenly mean and needed to be reminded that it was better to be calm and nice. 

"Can we pull up some chairs?" she said brightly. She held out a hand to Ricky. Ricky looked at it. Sighing, Jughead was the one who actually took it, giving all the other Serpents a very significant look. After that Ricky, Joaquin, and Spits all fell over themselves to shake Betty's hand. Diana crossed her arms and shook her head, apparently too iron-willed to give into even Betty. 

"We could all move to a middle booth," Archie suggested. "Then with some chairs we could all fit."

Jughead made waving motions with his hands, sighing. With a clatter of plates and cups and some hasty concealment of Hot Dog, the gang moved. Somehow in the move Joaquin ended up sitting on Kevin's lap (Kevin looked shocked but fine with it), and Cheryl and Diana ended up next to each other, sizing each other up like two very scary wild animals that couldn't decide whether to admire or attack.

"Is that a dog?" Ronnie said, taking the final chair. 

But then she took a deep breath, tucked her hair primly behind her ear, and said, "You know what? Nevermind." Turning to Spits, she said, "I overheard about the pizza bagels. _Supremely_ unfair. But I have to say, the low carb intake is working for you. You are the Natalie Wood of this whole Sharks versus Jets business."

Archie didn't know what she was talking about, but he was proud of her for making an effort. He leaned into Jughead and tried to put an arm around him, only to discover that Jughead had put his arm around Archie first. Warmth spread through him.

This was going to work. Archie said so.

"Yeah, maybe give the impromptu North Side-South Side social mixer more than twenty seconds before you call it a success, Arch," Jughead muttered. "We could break out into violence yet."

But Archie didn't think so. Already Spits was softening, Joaquin was playing with Kevin's hair, and Cheryl and Diana seemed to have settled into a quiet truce. Even Ricky wasn't complaining. 

When Betty pulled out a notepad and said, "Did I hear that you guys don't get the same kinds of facilities or food that we do? That's really unfair. Mind giving me a few quotes on it for the Blue & Gold?" Ricky actually hooted.

"Joaquin," he said, elbowing Joaquin in the side. "You hear? She's gonna put us in the paper."

"Mmmm-hmmm," said Joaquin, tracing Kevin's mouth with a finger.

Archie hadn't heard him ask for permission to do that, but then: he was a Serpent. They kind of worked differently than other people. Anyway, Kevin still wasn't complaining. Kevin looked like he'd won the lottery without even buying a ticket. Archie could relate.

"I meant that _this_ is going to work," he told Jughead now. Then he leaned in and kissed him.

Archie wasn't all that good, or at least no better than other people. And he was wrong more often than he was right. But when it came to this? When it came to this, he knew he was really, spectacularly right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end! Hope you liked it!


End file.
